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FIFTY REASONS FOR
BEING A HOMCEOPATH

Given by

J. COMPTON BURNETT, M.D.

Introduced and Edited by

J. ELLIS BARKER

Editor of Heal Thyself Homoeopathic World^O

It may sound oddly, but it is true, in many cases, that if men had learned less,
their way to knowledge would be shorter and easier. It is indeed shorter and
easier to proceed from ignorance to knowledge, than from error. They who
are in the last must unlearn before they can Icam to ary good purpose t and the
first part of this double task is not, in many respects, the least diificult ; for which
reason it is seldom undertaken.

Bolxkgskokb.

THE HOMCEOPATHIC PUBLISHING COMPANY

12 Warwick Lane, London, E.C.4

1934

PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BV HEADLEV BROTHERS
109 KINGSWAY, LONDON, WX .2 J AND ASHFORD. KENT

EDITOR'S FOREWORD

Dr. James Compton Burnett, the author of this small,
but excellent work, was bom in 1840 and he died in 1901,
largely owing to overwork, as do so many eminent doctors.
He was a great physician, a great medical pioneer and an
excellent author and j ournalist. During his spare moments
he wrote nearly thirty small volumes, most of which have
been long out of print, and they are highly prized by all
interested in the^^new art of healing,/ Pie brilliantly
edited the " Homceopathic World ” from 1879 to 1883.

Burnett was not only one of the most successful homceo-
pathic practitioners who was beloved by a vast number
of patients, but he was a great original thinker. More
than a century ago Hahnemann employed Psorinum, a
disease product, long before powerful microscopes and
the micro-organisms of disease were known. Walking in
his steps, Burnett experimented most successfully with
disease products, the so-called nosodes, guided by the
fundamental principle of homoeopathy that " likes are
cured by likes.” Orthodox medical men who know no
better believe that Dr. Robert Koch, who discovered the
bacillus of tuberculosis and who devised Tuberculin in the
hope that it would cure that disease, was the first to apply
the morbid matter of tuberculosis to curative purposes.
That is by no means the case. The credit belongs to
Burnett, who employed Bacillinum, Tuber culinum and
numerous other nosodes years before Koch's discovery
was made known to the world. If Burnett had been a
member of the orthodox profession, honours and titles
would have been lavished on him, and his name would be
known to every doctor throughout the world.

I hope that this wonderful book, which is a most excel-
lent introduction to homoeopathy, will have a very wide
sale among doctors and laymen. No medical man can
read the “ Fifty Reasons for Being a Homoeopath " with-
out being deeply moved. This volume should induce
numerous physicians and medical students to study the new
art of healing which has produced such wonderful results.
I hope that the re-publication of Burnett’s ” Fifty Reasons

4

for Being a Homoeopath ” will be followed by the re-issue
of many of his other works.

This little book is re-published without a.ny material
changes. The task of editing has been restricted to the
minimum. Only a few scientific words have been replaced
by plainer words, which will be more easily understood by
lay readers.

J. Ellis Barker.

Albion Lodge,

Fortis Green,

London, N.2.

PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION

The correspondence in the introduction to the following
pages explains the details and scope of this volume of
‘‘ Fifty Reasons for being a Homoeopath.” My position
in medicine is essentiaUy individualistic nevertheless,
and Virchow, m his “ Autoriiaten und Schulen " {Archiv,
V. Band, I. Heft), says that to which I fully subscribe,
VIZ., “ Die Parteigangerei der Schulen lasst sich nur
dadurch auflosen, dass man die Einzelnen emanzipirt,
dass^ man ihnen das Recht und die Mittel der Selbst-
bestimmung gewahrt, nicht dadurch, dass man alle in
einzige Partei, eine einzige Schule, eine einzige
Heerde Zusammentreibt.”

Primerose wrote against Harvey ! Hodiernal Prime-
ros^ write against Hahnemann ; of Primerose's writing
Mailer said, “ Suhtilitaiis satis et cavillamm, experi-
mentorum nihil.”

No one writes against Harvey now !

J. COMPTON BURNETT.

2 Finsbury Circus,

London, E.C.,

January, 1888.

INTRODUCTION

Dining last January vsdth a very genial M.P., residing,
when in town, at Royal Kensington, a fellow guest was
Dr. T. A. K . . ., a nephew of mine host, who had

just returned from a medical tour on the continent of
Europe, during which he had visited Paris, Heidelberg,
Vienna, Berlin, and other places of medical interest.

Over the almonds and raisins I slowly became con-
scious that I had been really entrapped by mine host and
patient into dining with him in order that said medical
nephew and I might go over the various pathies together ;
the uncle being very anxious that his doctor-nephew
should come out as a homoeopath.

Things went on quietly and smoothly at first, but
presently we both waxed warm, I lost my temper, and —
did not fold it again that evenifig. Indeed, when I heard
the whole body of homoeopaths stigmatized as quacks,
I did not mend matters by adopting the tu quoque line of
argument.

The protestations that the obnoxious epithet was not
meant to apply personally to me I could not accept,
for I affirmed it to be a necessary sequence that if the
homoeopaths as a body are quacks, it must follow that I
— ^the individual homoeopath— -must also be the same.
Be that as it may, I wound up by saying to Dr. K . . .,

“ My dear fellow, your mind is as full of scholastic con-
ceit as an egg is full of meat, and you are therefore a
doomed man so far as scientific mefficine is concerned;
your cup of knowledge is full, but full of knowledge of the
wrong sort ; your knowledge is like those Neapolitan
walnuts there, which have been dried in a kiln, and thereby
rendered sterile ; plant them and they will not germinate
and it is just thus with your scholastic learnings : all
you know was first dried in the kiln of the schools, and has
been rendered sterile — incapable of germinating. Kiln-
dried walnuts have a certain value as food, but they are
dead ; your knowledge has a certain value as mental food
for other students if you like to turn teacher, but it is

e>

scholastically dried up and sterilized. You have no living
faith in living physic— so far as the really direct healing
of the sick is concerned all your medicine is dead, as dead
as a door nail.”

“ Perhaps so,” retorted Dr. K. ” I suppose you mean
that yours is the only one true way to medical salvation ;
that is just like you homoeopaths, and let me say that
that is the very reason why we regular practitioners do
sometimes call homoeopaths quacks — there, do not flare
up again. I tell you I do not apply the term to you
personally.”

“ Precisely,” said I, " the old, old story of abuse and
slander of the absent, but no reason. Why, I could give
fifty reasons for being a homoeopath, that if not singly at
least collectively would convince a stone.”

“ Fifty reasons for being a homoeopath, my dear
doctor, pray let us have them, I have never heard one
good reason yet ; here, uncle, you go on to bed, I am
going to stay up and have these fifty reasons that are going
to show me how to cure all the ^seases under the sun,
including my morhus scholasticus, my ‘ scholastic con-
ceit,’ and all, of course,. in strict accordance with the
canting formula, similia similibus cur&ntur (turning
towards me), my dear doctor, fifty reasons are rather a
big dose, even if each one be only a tiny globule ! ”

By this time I was in the h^, and bade a “ Good-
night, all ! ”

But it did not end there ; for my “ regular ” brother
at once sat down and rattled off the following, wdiich
reached me early the next day : —

Dear Sir, Referring to your rather boastful state-
ment, made just now at my uncle’s table, that you
could give me fifty reasons for being a homoeopath, and
to your then failing to make it good in a straightforward
way, on account, as you alleged, of the lateness of the
hour (though it is now only eleven o’clock), I at once
write you with the object of giving you an opportunity
of stating your fifty reasons. In limine, let me say that
notwithstanding my “ scholastic conceit ” (you seem to
be very much down on the schools !) and my “ Neapolitan
walnut sterility ” (mental merely, I hope /), I only want
to get at the truth.

Like yourself, I have been educated in the schools
(and since you were educated in the schools yourself,

7

it seems to me that your abuse of them is very ungrateful) ;
but I do not start with the presumption that I already
know better than my masters, and they have taught me
that Hahnemann was an old quack, a braggart, and an
ignoramus, and the so-called homoeopaths are a set of
people with whose methods and manners I have, to put
it mildly, no sympathy whatever.

You seem to have a very robust faith in your homoeo-
pathy, and I now formally challenge you to come forward
with those fifty reasons which you, somewhat braggishly,
as I must submit, claim to be able to give.

Yours sincerely,

T. A. K . . .

De. Burnett,

5 Holies Street, W.

Thus runs my reply :

Dear Sir, It is not fifty reasons merely that I could
give you for being a homoeopath, but fifty times fifty !
But ars longa, vita brevis, and — will you add the rest.

You are well aware that I am a busy person, and so
cannot easily spare the time requisite to give my reasons
in full, and in a manner that would satisfy a trained mind
such as yours.

If you really want to get at the truth about Hahne-
mann and his homoeopathy, may I suggest that you
study the works of this same Halmemann and those of
a score or two of his more illustrious disciples. The thing
has not been done in the dark or in a corner, and you
can obtain the works at almost any homoeopathic chemist’s
— there is one close to you in Ebury Street.

Let me beg you particularly to read Dr. Hughes’s
" Pharmacodynamics ” and “ Therapeutics ” ; Granier’s
“ Conferences upon Homoeopathy ” ; Dudgeon’s Trans-
lations of Hahnemann’s Writings — in fact, everything
written by Dr. Dudgeon and his able coadjutors in the
" British Journal of Homoeopathy.”

And when you have done this, and want still to know
some more of the truth about Hahnemann, read the
various Hahnemannian Orations given of late years by
Drs. Dudgeon, Hughes, Pop, Clarke, as also the one by
myself, entitled “ Ecce Mechcus.”

And if you further care to know what a grand reality
our Materia Medica is, pray take a look at " Allen’s

Encyclopsedia of Pure Materia Medica " ; — ^you will find
them all and many more in my library, which is at your
service, if you are truly a seeker after medical truth as
it is in homoeopathy.

I shall also be pleased to introduce you to the phy-
sicians at the London Homoeopathic Hospital, where you
can watch the work done.

Believe me, we homoeopaths are not what you have been
taught to think ; we have no secrets ; we aim, all of us
each according to his ability and in his own way, to ad-
vance the true interests of our beneficent art, and our
most earnest desire before God and man is to teach all
we know to all knowledge-seeking lovers of truth.

I will not mince matters with you : those who tell you
that Hahnemann was an ignorant quack, that the homoeo-
paths are quacks, are— well, they say the thing that is
not. The word I should like to use would shock you,
perhaps ; be it so, you know what I mean. Tell it from
the house-tops, and let it shock a callous, leech-ridden
stupid world. '

Yours faithfully,

Tr J- Burnett.

Dr. K . . .,

Kensington.

I then got this :

Dear Sir, You express yourself in language that is
rather stronger than we are accustomed to in the

schools ; but let that pass ; strong language is not
^gument. With all due respect for you, I think it ill
becomes you to reproach the regular profession with bein^
abu^ye towards the homoeopaths, in whom and in whose
practice we do not beheve ; at least we do not call you
Mrs. But as I &st used the word quack, I suppoi I
must put up with ‘ liar." i'f *

I suggest we do not depart from sober, dispassionate
speech, and that, m lieu of abuse, you give me vour
fifty reasms for being a homceopath. You Ly you cLld
give me not merely fifty reasons, but fifty times fifty "
and then you wmd up by giving me no reason at ah, &t
references to your hterature ! Why, the very mak of
your hterature is itself a strong reason with^e for not
bemg a homceopath ! I cannot be all my life at school

y

as it is, some think the schools have not had a very desir-
able effect upon me !

I cannot say like you, that I am a busy person, but I am
negotiating for the purchase of a practice in Manchester,
or, rather, a partnership, and then I shall be busy enough
with all the night drudgery and midwifery, I dare say-
hut what is one to do ? My uncle insists that I shall go
into partnership with an older man, and I must obey,
as he finds the money. But this is digressive. I am now
only writing to express my obligation to you for your kind
offer to let me have all those works from your library.
No ; thanks many. I have no inclination to spend my
time in perusing all those works, nor indeed any of them.

I am wen aware that you homoeopaths write an amazing
number of books on all conceivable subjects, and I believe
you yourself are responsible for some, but I do not want
your literature, nor do I feel any inclination to wade
through the nauseous laudations of the Master (!) by the
various Hahnemann Orators (save the mark) — ^for they
all amount to this : there is but one God — ^homoeopathy
(no, I beg pardon, Homoeopathy, always with a big H I),
and Halmemann is the Prophet. Not only do I not want
to borrow any of the numerous works you mention from
your library, but I do not want long-winded quotations
by you from them by way of reasons ; of course, with
your facile pen you could easily work up fifty quotations
from literature as reasons, but these I decline ; I want
your reasons if you really have them ; that is to say,
real, live, practical reasons from your own professional
life ; reasons that need not be powerful enough “ to
convince a stone, either singly or collectively,” but which
shah at least show that you have the reasons you profess
to be able to give.

There is altogether too much brag about you homoeo-
paths ; it seems to me that you profess to cure aU that the
profession declare to be incurable, such as cancer, epilepsy,
consumption, and tumours. I believe you even profess
to cure cataract with medicines. WeU, all I can say is,

I should like to see the man who has dissolved aispnDe
cataract with medicines. I have no hesitation in [j. 'iing
the thiug is impossible.

Yours sincerely,

T. A.

Dr. Burnett.

10

Thereupon I replied :

Dear Sir, You are a little hard upon homoeopaths
I must say, and upon me in particular ; but for this I
have myself to blame for having condescended to discuss
with you a subject of which you are so profoundly
ignorant, viz., homoeopathy. I can only discuss botany
with a botanist, zoology with a zoologist ; this you will
surely admit. But you seem to think I can discuss
homoeopathy with you, although you fairly boast of
your ignorance of the subject.

I, in a moment of excitement, rashly offered to give
Fifty Reasons for Being a Homoeopath, and as I under-
stand your position, you pin me fixedly to that offer,
and insinuate that if I do not give those reasons it must
necessarily be because I cannot. I reiterate that I
could give you fifty times fifty, although, perhaps, not
all out of my own experience. Nor do I think it fair
that you should shut out our literature for the purpose
of giving those fifty reasons ; at least you must allow me
to quote from my own published works, as in them is
already published the cream of what I know and have
seen.

And may I ask you, in common fairness, to make at
least a preUminary study of the principles of homoeopathy
in the works I have named or in such others as you may
prefer, and then we could proceed with a fair dispassionate
study of the various issues which may present themselves
for enquiry.

What is the use of sneering at our reported cures of
cancer, epilepsy, consumption, cataract, and tumours ;
at least they show that we do try to cure them, which
is more than your school does. For instance, I have
myself over and over again maintained the curability of
some of these diseased states by remedies, but how could
I discuss the subjects with you when you do not know
the merest elements of our method ? To understand
what I say you must be familiar not only with Homoeo-
pathic Propaedeutics, but also with what I would call the
Penetralia Homoeopathica, but you entirely lack the
patience and perseverance necessary hereto, and I doubt
whether you have the real love of the truth for her own
sake in you. “ Seek and ye shall find ” is true here also,
but ym must seek first, which is just what you refuse to
do,, and yet you expect to find.

You oWm to be ■■ regular -brt

You claim the right to .f trShh nets ^on

reported by eminent homceopathx p ‘ - -

what principle or ground ? Wer® « i A

eee tbe cafes ? You know nothmg of ta ^ hY
you have never tried it, and yet you da . b
judgment upon homoeopathic work. ‘

chronic delusion : when you say you do not bdicvt thih

professors cannot ; we agree they cannot Do cuh'O at an,
therefore these pretended cures of the honnyopaths ate
not real. In other words, you cannot cut a piece; of clot ti
with a steel key, and it therefore follows that I cannot
cut it with steel scissors, because both key and scissor-s
are made of steel. You say steel cannot cut it ; I say
it can ; and when we come to enquire into the inalter, it
is found that you mean a steel key, whereas I mean .steel

If you want roasted pigeon for dimxer you must procure
the pigeon and roast it ; it will not fall ready rotisted
into your mouth.

Will you at least take in the MontUy Hommtpaihtc
Review, the Homoeopatkic World, and the Hahnemanman
Monthly, for — ^say — one year ? and then we will resume
the subject.

What would you say if your gardener were to put in
his seed without getting rid of the weeds and preparing
the groiin/X .3 .go here : I want yon to root out the weeds
of scholastic prejudice and prepare your mental ground
at least in some small measure, or I shall only sow giiod
seed that either by reason of the unprejt.'u-ed soil will not
spring up at aU, or else will struggle in vain with the
weeds of conceit, ignorance and prejudice.

Come, friend; fair play, even for hated and tlespised
homoeopathy.

Yours truly,

J. C. Hvkkkti'.

Dr. K.

Dr. K. next wrote :

Dear Sir, I am writing this from Manclacstm’, a.s you
see, where I have now entered upon the partneislnp.
which I previously mentioned to you. 'Hiis will e.vphui»

the delay in writing in reply to your last communication.
I have spoken to my partner about our discussion and
your still-to-be-given fifty reasons for being a homoeopath,
and what do you think he says ? He says, “ It is all rot ! "
In which crude, vulgar dictum I am disposed to concur,
though I mean no offence to you, as I know you believe
in the theories you advance. And I admit a certain
justice in your demand that I should study homoeopathy
before proceeding to discuss it ; but then you will note
that I do not pretend to discuss it, or if I did I here renounce
any such pretension, and I will merely say — ^give me
your promised fifty reasons. And you will not teach me
because I am, forsooth, ignorant. I should have thought
that were an additional reason for giving me instruction.
I am as desirous as anyone to know the truth, though I
am not exactly an enthusiast, but I must push on with
my practice, as I am shortly to be married.

I condemn homoeopathy without knowing anytliing
about it, you say. Be it so ; but you must remember
that I have the same authority for ail I know of medicine,
viz., that of my teachers at the University of Cambridge,
who not only taught me all I know of medicine, but they
also taught me to condemn Hahnemann and homoeopathy.
I cannot follow you into all the issues which you raise,
but will at once come from the abstract to the concrete —
Will you or will you not give me your fifty reasons for being
a homoeopath ? I do not care whether your reasons have
ever been published or not, provided they be your own,
and not got together out of everybodj/ ’s b'^'^V<; ; but they
must be as you originally said at my uncle’s house — I
remember your promise quite well in substance : You
said you could give me fifty reasons for being a homoeopath
out of your own lifework and professional experience.
To this I certainly do pin you, or you must come down
the tree.

Yours sincerely,

T. A. K. . . .

Dr. Burnett.

My final consent ran thus :

Dear Sir, Inasmuch as I said that I could give you
fifty reasons for being a homoeopath, and you insist upon
keeping me to it or “ come down the tree,” I must submit

13

as even an army does, to force majeure, and so I will make
a beginning the first spare moment.

As I cannot possibly give them all at once, I propose to
divide them into as many parts as there are reasons to be
given.

You must please keep in mind that I do not allow you
any right whatever of reply or discussion, as you will not
first study the subject, and I cannot admit that even a
" regular ” practitioner can know a thing without learning
it. I shall write to you en maitre. You will have my
fifty reasons ; very good, you shall have them — every one
of them, if I live.

Yours truly,

J. C. Burnett.

Dr. T. A. K.

Note . — Not a few of my colleagues have objected to the
prominence herein given to the personality of the writer :
how was I to avoid this in a personal narrative ?

14 Enlarged Tonsils

sonn as the primary sore had been
compelled to heal up, there ap-
peared on the right tonsil a sore
that could not be distinguished
from the ordinary- hard chancre,
and proved ver\' rebellious to treat-
ment — in fact, it is still going on.

But syphilis does not lend itself
so well to demonstrate my point,
though my own mind is quite
made up in regard to its phe-
nomena and cure. I have thought
that chronic tubercular processes
might be better adapted for my
purpose, so before we enter any
further into the questions that
here concern us, we might, with
advantage, inquire whether the
mode of progress of certain tuber-
cular processes is centrifugal or

FIFTY REASONS FOR BEING
A HOMOEOPATH

I.

A NUMBER of years ago, on a dull, dreary afternoon,
which I had partly occupied at B — Hospital with writing
death certificates, I suddenly rose and felt something
come over me for the fiftieth time at that period. I
hardly knew what, but it grew essentially out of my
unsatisfactory clinical results. I had been an enthusiastic
student of medicine originally, but an arrantly sceptic
professor quite knocked the bottom out of all my faith
in physic and overmuch hospital work and responsibilities,
grave beyond my age and experience, had squeezed a
good deal of the enthusiasm out of me. After pacing up
and down the surgery, I threw myself back into my chair
and dreamily thought myself back to the green fields and
the early bird’s-nesting and fishing days of my childhood.
Just then a corpse was carried by the surgery window, and
I turned to the old dispenser and enquired in a petulant
tone, "Tim, who’s that dead now? ’’ " Little Georgie, Sir.”

Now little Georgie was a waif who belonged to nobody,
and we had liked him and had kept him about in odd
beds, as one might keep a pet animal. Everybody liked
little Georgie ; the most hardened old pauper would do
him a good turn, and no one was ever more truly regretted
than he.

It all came about in this way : One day I wanted a bed
for an acute case, and I ordered little Georgie out of his
bed in a warm, snug corner to another that was in front
of a cold window ; he went to it, caught cold, had
pleurisy, and Tim’s reply gives the result.

Said I to myself : If I could only have stopped the
initial fever that followed the chiH by the window, Georgie
had probably lived. But three medical men besides
myself had treated Georgie — all in unison — ^and all hos-
pital men ; still pleurisy followed the febricula, dropsy

M

l6

followed the pleurisy, and poor little Georgie died. Old
Tim was a hardened man and I never saw him show any
feeling or sentiment of any kind, or regret anybody’s
death, but I verily believe he was very near dropping
just one wee tear over Georgie’s memory, for I noticed
that his attention was needlessly and unwontedly fixed
on the surface of the bottles he was washing. Be that as it
may, Georgie was no more, and I felt sure that he need
NOT HAVE DIED, and this consciousness nearly pressed me
down into the earth.

That evening a medical friend from the Royal Infirmary
turned up to dinner with me, and I told him of my trouble,
and of my half determination to go to America and turn
farmer; at least I should be able to lead a wholesome
natural life.

He persuaded me to study homoeopathy first, and refute
it, or, if apparently true, to try it in the hospital.

After many doubts and fears — ^very much as if I were
contemplating a crime — I procured Hughes’s ’Pharmaco-
dymmics and Therapeutics, which my friend said were a
good introduction to homoeopathy.

I mastered their main points in a week or two, and
came from a consideration of these to the conclusion
either that homoeopathy was a very grand thing indeed,
or this Dr. Hughes must be a very big . . . No, the

word is unparliamentary. You don’t like the word — ?
Well, I do, it expresses my meaning to a T ; on such an
important subject there is for me no middle way. It
must be either good clear God’s truth, or black lying. A
fool the man could not possibly be, since it would be quite
impossible for a fool to write the books. And as he seemed
to speak so eloquently from a noble soul, it lifted me right
out of the slough of despond — ^for a little while, but then
came a reaction ; had I not often tried vaunted specifics
and plans of treatment, and been direfuUy disappointed ?
So my old skepsis took possession of me. " 'V^at,” said
I, " can ^h things be ? ” No, impossible. I had been
nurtured in the schools, and had there been taught by good
men and true that homoeopathy was therapeutic Nihilism.
No, I could not be a homoeopath ; I would try the thing
at the bedade, prove it to be a lying diam, and expose it
to an admiring profession !

I was full of febricula on accoimt of Georgie’s fate, so
studied the say of the homoeopaths thereon, and found

17

that they claimed to cut short simple fever with Aconite.
Ah, thought I, if that be true. Aconite would have saved
little Georgie if given in time at the very onset.

Well, feverish colds and chills were common enough Just
then, and I had, moreover, a ward where children thus
taken ill were put till their diseases had declared them-
selves, and then they were drafted off to the various wards,
for that purpose provided, with pneumonia, pleurisy,
rheumatism, gastritis, measles, as the case might be.

I had some of Fleming’s Tincture of Aconite in my sur-
gery, and of this I put a few drops into a large bottle of
water and gave it to the nurse of said children’s ward,
with instructions to administer of it to aU the cases on the
one side of the ward as soon as they were brought in.
Those on the other side were not to have the Aconitic
solution, but were to be treated in the authorized orthodox
way, as was theretofore customary. At my next moniing
visit I found nearly all the youngsters on the Aconik
side feverless, and mostly at play in their beds. But one
had the measles, and had to be sent to the proper ward.
Hound A cpnite did not cure me^es. The others remained
a'^day or two, and were then returned whence they had
originally come.

Those on the non- Aconite orthodox side were worse, or
about the same and had to be sent into hospital — mostly
with localized inflammations, or catarrhs, measles, etc.

And so it went on day after day, day after day : those
that got Aconite were generally convalescent in twenty-
four or forty-eight hours, except in the coniparatively
s^dom cases where the seemingly simple chiU was the
prodromal stage of a specific ^sease such as mea-sles,
scarlatina, rheumatic fever : these were barely influenced
by the Aconite. But the great bulk of the cases were all
genuine chills, and the Aconite cured the greater part right
off, though the little folks were usually pale, and had
perspired, as I subsequently learned, needlessly much.

I had told the nurse nothing about the contents of my
big bottle, but she soon baptized it " Dr. Burnett’s Fever
Bottle."

For a little while I was simply dumbfounded, and I
spent much of my nights studying homoeopathy : I had
no time during the day.

One day I was unable to go my usual rounds tlirough
the wards ; in fact I think I was absent two days — from

i8

Saturday till Tuesday— and on entering the said children's
ward the next time in the early morning, the nurse seemed
rather quiet, and informed me, with a certain forced duti-
fulness that all the cases might, she thought, be dismissed.
“ Indeed,” said I, “ how’s that ? ”

” Well, doctor, as you did not come round on Sunday
and yesterday, I gave your fever medicine to them all ;
and, indeed, I had not the heart to see you go on with your
cruel experiments any longer : you are like all the young
doctors that come here— you are only trying experiments 1 ”
I merely said “ Very well, nurse ; give the medicine
in future to all that come in.” This was done till I left
the place, and the result of this Aconite medication for
chills and febricula was usually rapid defervescence,
followed by convalescence. But when the stomach was
much involved, I at times found the Aconite useless, unless
vomiting occurred, and so in such cases I administered a
mild emetic, whereupon defervescence at once set in, and,

! though a homoeopath now for a good many years, I stiU
th^ a mild enietic the right treatmrat when the stcOTach
is laden and cannot unburden itself By natural vomit.

Biit stiU this is only by the way : t enter into all these
preliminary, incidental and concomitant circumstances
merely to put you on the same ground whereon I myself
stand ; they are not essential, for they only lead to this :
Aconitum in febricula was, and is, my first reason for being
a homoeopath.

Have you as good a reason for being a “ regular ? ”

n.

Ah ! my good fellow, I thought you would say that you
also msi Aconite for fever, and that therefore it is not
necessarily homoeopathy. But do you not know of a
certaia French gentleman who spoke prose all his life
without knowing it ?

A man that gives Aconite for febricula is a homoeopath
malgri lui. But to my second reason.

When I was a lad I had pleurisy of the left side, and,
mth the hdp of a vill^e apothecary, and half-a-hogshead
ra mixture, nearly died, though not quite. From that
time on I had a dull, uneasy sensation in my side, about
which I consulted many eminent physicians in various
parts of Europe, but no one could help me. All agreed

19

that it was an old adhesive something between the visceral
and costal layers of the pleura, but no one of my many
eminent advisers could cure it. And yet my faith in them
was big enough to remove mountains. So faith as a
remedy did no good.

When orthodox medicine proved unhelpful, I went to
the hydropaths (they were called " quacks ” then !)
and had it hot, and cold, and long ; but they also did me
no good. Packs cold, and the reverse ; cold compresses
worn for months together ; sleeping in wet sheets ; no
end of sweatings — ^Turkish and Russian — all left my
old pleuritic trouble in statu quo ante.

The grape cure ; the bread-and-wine cure, did no better.
Nor did diet and change help me.

However, when I was studying what the peculiar
people called homoeopaths have to say about their Bry -
qnia alba, and its affinity for serous^m^^Mes, I — ^what ?
^^^^^iiiseH them and cajled them quacks ? ^No ! — I bought
some Bryonia alba, and took it as they recommended, and
m a fortnight my side was well, and has never troubled
me since ! “

'“ There, friend, that is my second reason for being a
homoeopath, and when I cease to be grateful to dear old
Hahnemann for his Bryonia, may my old pleural trouble
return to remind me of the truth of his teaching.

What you and the world in general may think of it I
care not one straw : I speak well of the bridge that carried
me over.

For my part, I make but one demand of medicine, and
one only, viz., that it shall cure! The pathy that will
cure is the pathy for me. For of your fairest pathy I
can but say —

What care I how fair she be.

If she be not fair to me ?

You can have what opinion you like of my old pleuritis
affection : I had the wretched thing till I took Bryonia,
and I have never had it since. Myself, I am sweetly
content with my second reason for being a homoeopath.
I never said the remedy was first used by the homoeopaths ;
that is not of the essence of my proposition.

20

Since going over into the homoeopathic camp, I have
often had to treat pleurisy : that you will not find it
difficult to believe. Aconite and Bryonia are the big
guns of the homoeopaths for pleurisy, but I will remark,
as the outcome of my own experience, that it is only in
what I would call

Pleuritis Rheumatica

that they really hit the mark. Let me relate such a case
to you as my third reason for being a homoeopath.

Some years since I was suddenly summoned to the
suburban house of a city merchant, who had caught a
chill two evenings before on returning from a political
meeting. When I arrived, ^ exquisite case of pleurisy,
pleuritis rheumatica, presented itself.

The gentleman’s wife informed me that she was much
exercised in her mind, as many friends had strongly urged
her not to have homoeopathy in such a serious case. All
very well, said they, perhaps, for women and children,
but she surely was not going to risk her dear husband’s
life in the hands of a homoeopathic practitioner ? No,
she would have Dr. X., who lived near by. But though,
as a rule, L’homme propose et la femme dispose, in this case
it was the other way about. The husband flatly refused
any other than homoeopathic treatment, and hence my
presence. He was in a raging fever and much pain, and
inerely moaned, “ Doctor, give me relief from this pain,
and procure rne some sleep.”

I gave Aconite and Bryonia — strong.

Next day he was already a little round the comer, and
not m much pain, unless he incautiously turned.
" Doctor,” said he, “ my friend Mr. — in — road over
yonder, has, I am told, something of the same thing asj
have, only more in the shoulder, and he has sent to me
to beg me to give you up, and have his medical man, who
lives near by, and who is considered a very clever man —
what am I to say ? ” I replied, " Tell him from me that
I diall have you well in your city office in a few da 3 ;s at
work, and that on your way home from the city you may
c^, and you will sii1l find him ill, and then you can teH
him your experience, and compare notes ! ”

And so it happened, in a few days — I do not remember
the exact number— my patient went to his city office.

21

did a small amount of work, and on returning home
called on or sent to his said friend, who was still in great
pain, and remained so for some time.

IV

Your note wotild infer that I was not dealing in my last
letter with a case of true pleurisy.

Given a man who had pleurisy himself twice ; who
laboured twelve weeks in bed therewith ; who went about
all his student life with a painful sequel of pleurisy ;
who read all he could find in literature on pleurisy ; who
listened to lectures by Skoda on pleurisy for weeks to-
gether with personal interest ; who saw scores of cases of
pleurisy while walking the hospitals ; who was, as it
happened, examined at his " final ” on pleurisy ; and who,
in his own subsequent practice, has treated very many
cases of pleurisy — I am that man !

Well, now I must give you my fourth reason for being
a homoeopath. The gentleman referred to in my last
letter (my patient’s friend), after he got over his acute
sufferings went to a specisdist for g'out , but was still so
stiffened in his shoulder and side thatlie was not able to
do his office duty, and after remaining faithfully under his
own doctor for a further period and still not getting well,
finally — What ? Came to me ! And what next ?
Bryonia alba, Chdidonium majus, and Sulphur, cured him
in a few weeks.

It seems to me that Aconite and Bryonia alone, if weU
studied and rightly used, would convert the whole world
to homoeopathy, at least I see no escape for any honest
MMprejudiced man.

But prejudice is well-nigh almighty. As Bolingbroke
says “ It may sound oddly, but it is true, in many cases,
that if men had learned less, their way to knowledge
would be shorter and easier. It is, indeed, shorter and
easier to proceed from ignorance to knowledge than from
error. They who are in the last must unlearn before they
can learn to any good purpose ; and the first part of this
double task is not in many respects the least dififtcult,
for which reason it is seldom undertaken.”

Did you understand anything about homoeopathy I
would explain to you why I gave the Bryonia, why it was

22

followed by Chelidonium, and why Sulphttr had to be
interposed; as you are, however, ignorant, you must
take it empirically.

V

I leave you to study the wider therapeutic bearings of
Aconite in common feverishness and as a preventive of
inflammatory localizings, and also the specific elective
affini ty of the white Bryonia for the serous membranes,
as exemplified in my own case, as well as in the other two ;
I did not promise you didactic lectures on the various
points I bring forward, but only my Fifty Reasons. So
now for my fifth : it is this — Homceopathy lifts me at one
stroke from the dependent position of a groping journey-
man healer of disease to the proud position of a master of
the healing art. Let me exemplify by quoting almost in
full a case I once published, under this heading : —

On the Use OFi, C hloral HYDRATE.fiN Lethargic
Somnolency ;

Those who have watched oW chloral-eaters may have
noficeH' that "they slowly j;et leth^gic, somnolent, anS
pB,ess'~ Tbwar<ls the end* of the chapter of chronic
chlbralism there is a condition of fatty degeneration of
a diow, lazy type, and the very mode of death seems
peculiar. I have seen a case where the subject of chronic
chloralism lay for days a-dying ; she was for several days
so that it was very difficult to determine whether she was
dead or not.

Occasionally one comes across a remarkable case of
somnolence, and then the narcotics are to be thought of
by the therapeutist.

. I will shortly rdate two such cases from my own
practice.

No. I. ^ A lady about forty-five years of age, stout,
fresh-looking, and the mother of a family, was the subject
of remark of her friends, on account of her lethargy and
' Her weakness was such that even crossing
almost impossible; the weakness was
a kind of listieK Heaviness. She was
almost constancy aSeep ; she wotdd get up in the

23

morning after a good night’s rest and, even while dressing,
she seemed compelled to sit down, and no sooner seated
but she would fall asleep. This state of things went on
for weeks and months, and her allopathic adviser did his
best in va i n. After she came under my care I tried first
Arnica and then Opium, with but indffierent success,
when all at once I ^thought me of the great similarity
of the case before me to that of a confirmed old chloral-
eater of my clientele.

^CUoral in a low dilution cured my patient, and she
again became brisk, active and wide awake.

No. 2. An elderly lady came under my care on April
2 ist, i88i, for lethargy, languor, and somnolence.

B Trit. 2x Chloral hydrat., 6 grains in water every
three hours.

May 7th. Under this date I find these notes in my
case book ; — ” Feels a different creature ; vastly im-
proved ; less lethargic, and decidedly less languid.”

She then got the\tWrd decim^ trituratipn.rin lieu of
t^e second, and only Fwo doses a day, and then hl^ded no
further treatment, as she subsequently informed me when
calling with her husband.

Now you can see what I mean ; I had before me cases
that would not readily fit into any nosological cadre, and
yet I was enabled to treat the case en maitre. This is
therapeutic mdependence which I love, and affords,
as I submit, a very sound reason indeed for being a
homoeopath.

Had I not so many more reasons to give I should very
much like to dilate on this transcendental advantage of
Homoeopathy : its law is a guide in the darkest disease ;
of this more in my next.

VI

What I mean in my fifth reason requires to be insisted
upon a little more, that you may perceive my meaning
the more clearly. I said Homoeopathy raises one from
the dependent position of a journeyman therapeutist
to that of a master.

E.g . — Some years since, as you may perhaps know,
a drug called came up in your school as a cure

for cancer, niuch as Chian turpentine did subsequently.

24

and, like it, had its little day, and then passed out of
sight.

Cundumngo, thought I, will certainly only cure one
variety of cancer, not all. How are we to know which ?
The clinical records of Cundumngo showed that it reahy
has genuine curative power over some cases of cancer,
particularly of the stomach. Hahnemaim taught that
the true way' to define the curative sphere of a drug is
to give it to healthy people, to see what it would do
to them.

I procured some of the Cundumngo bark, made an
infusion, and drank quantities of it. You will find my
report on the subject in Allen’s Encyclopcsdia of Pure
Materia Medica. Well, I found that it causes {inter alia)

' cracks in the angles of the mouth.

Subsequently I had to treat; a case of cancer of the left
breast in a middle-aged woman, "but patieiit had also a deep
pr^ in the angle of her mouth on the left side, with thick
indurated edges, probably of an epitheliomatous nature.
I think you would have agreed with the diagnosis had
you seen the case. I therefore reasoned thus : — ^We
know empirically thaA^Cundurango^ can cure some cases
of cancer; I now know from the direct experiment on
mjraeif that it causes the angles of the mouth to crack ;
the homoeopaths maintain that likes cure likes, ergo,
Cundurango ought to be the curative agent in this case.

Ihe patient took a homoeopathic preparation of the
remedy steadily for about three years, with gradual, slow
melioration, and eventual perfect cure. Since then
aghf yeairs have elapsed, and she is still in excellent
health. I think, it must be manifest that, had it not
been for Homoeopathy, this cure could not have been
wrought, and patient must long since have died of the
dire disease.

Therefore, please accept this as my sixth reason for
being a homoeopath. And, learned brother, what a
proud position, too ! Of course it is not “ regular
Alas ! that it is not.

VII

This shall also be in further elucidation of my conten-
tion that Homoeopathy turns the groping, bungling
treater of disease into a master of the b^aling art.

25

Ever since the year 1878 I have been in the habit of
using Vanadium as a remedy in a class of cases that,
outside of Homoeopathy, you cannot touch — I mean in
certain cases of katheroma^f the arteries, ^d^aity^
^degeneration/ I had beeri" in' the habit of using Phos-
phorus, Antimony, Arsenic, and the like, but was not
satisfied with my result in certain cases ; nothing satisfies
me but a cure. So I went further afield, and thought I had
found what I wanted in Vanadium, whose physiological
effects I studied in the Proceedings of the Royal Society.

I got the differential points from an article in the Journal
of Physiology by Mr. G. F. Dowdeswell entitled " On the
Structural Changes which are Produced in the Liver
under the Influence of the Salts of Vanadium.” In a
word, let me say that it consists in true cell destruction,
the pigment escaping, the liver being hit hardest. I had
a case on hand of^atty. liye^ atheroma of the Series,
much pain corr^pohding |b the course of the basflar
large\dee|)ly pigmented^atches pn forehead/
profound adynarni'a, and so form. "

Well, my patient was then over seventy, aijd was very
dearly breaking up and going to pass the big bourne
whence no man returneth. Thanks to the use of Vanad-
ium (I used the solublAyn momum salt/ in homoeopathic
preparation, chosen acc^^ 5 g^"tfee‘“bomceopathic law,
that lady got quite well, and remains so, being now hard
upon eighty years of age, and hale and hearty.

This is what I call being a master of the art of healing,
and that you may truly realize the entire independence
of my proceeding, I may tell you that thus far Vanadium
(so far as I know) has never even now been used in
medicine at all, except by m3^elf.

Of course, as you are a “ regular ”, you would not so
far have forgotten your di^ty as to go in quest of a
remedy for yom: case, holding on humbly and hopefully
to the Hahnemannic law.

Please allow the now by me clinically proved
homoeopathidty of Vanadium to a certam form of
fatty decay stand as my seventh reason for being a
homoeopath.

My other Vanadium cases I will not trouble you with —
they only prove the same point ; besides, I have still
forty-three reasons to give you.

26

VIII

A lady living not far from your uncle’s, in Kensington,
came to me on June 5th, 1882, with a sore, gnawing jjain
in her left side, the pain being at times sharp and darting,
and seated just under the ribs, in the r^on of the spleen ,
worse at night when she got warm in bed. Concomitantly
herewith the left eye is involved ; its pimcta lachrymaUa
are very red. This is a comparatively simple case of
disease, yet withal very painful, and patient came to me
to he mrei. I am sure as a " regular " this case would
completely baffle anyone. Without a scientific law to
guide you, you woifid not be able to tackle the case
curatively at all. It offered no particular difficulty to me,
and I cured it with an essence of the common European
walnut ! Fancy the walnut tree for such a case ! We
call it Juglans regia, and I gave five drops of the first
centesimal dilution in water three times a day. Would
you like to know the scientific why of this case ?
Only Homoeopathy and the mundane doings of the late
Clotar Muller can tell you.

Here again, you see how the law of similars gives
executive potentiality to one's knowledge of drug physio-
logy and, moreover, affords ms my eighth reason for not
being a “ regular ".

IX

You object to my " jeering, offensive tone ”. May
I remind you, my " regular ” friend, that you began the
“ jeering ” ? At yotu: uncle’s you plumed yours^ upon
being a " regular ”, and thought you were looking down
from a mighty height upon the homoeopaths ! You
insisted upon having my fifty reasons, and I am sending
them as fast as I can, and if I parenthetically do a little
jeerii^, you will please remember that I have the most
absolutely unspeakable contempt for your ignorance,
from the top of which you had the brazen effrontery to
call the homoeopaths quacks ! You, the grossly ignorant,
prejudiced " regular ”, call flippantly upon me to justify
my prof^sional position. When I speak of your ignorance
I mean your ignorance of the art of healii^; of other
kinds of Imowledge I know you are full.

27

I have given you a case of pain in the left hypochon-
drium cured by Juglans regia ; not many weeks after
that case was cured, as stated, a young lady came to
consult me in regard to a very similar pain, but hers was
of the rigM side; at the bottom of the right lung. She had
£ad it for tbree months, and was pulled down by it a good
deal, having become weak and anaemic.

.Chdidonium majus i,_ five drojps in watCT night ^d
monung^_ cured it specific^y in just a fortnight. It
Sould like to discuss wifh^'you tbe reason why I'gave
Juglans regia in the one case of pain in the one side, and
Chelidonium majus in the other ; but I have not the time,
so this must end my account of my ninth reason.

X

You are quite mistaken in sa3dng that what rendered
me, after my “ manner of speech ”, a master of the
heading art, is limited in its application. That is just
what it is not, else where is the maistership ? Getting
a firm grip of the homoeopathic law affords me a guide
under almost all circumstances. Let me further exemplify
my meaning by adducing a case of —

Chronic Hiccough ;

To begin with, if you have no experience with really
bad cases of hiccough, ask your older partner, and he will
tell you that they aire very troublesome at times, and by no
means easy to cure. And hiccough is again one of those
cases that do not fit easily into any nosological system.

In the early part of 1883, a young lady was brought to
me suffering from a number of morbid S3nnptoms, the
most promising of which was Singultus (hiccough). She
would get it in attacks lasting about half an hour each,
^d of these there were generally four a day. In view of
the concomitants — emansion of the menses, leucorrhoea,
tMrst, much saliva in the mouth— I considered that the
hiccough was reflected from the uterus. You know
something of the views I hold on vaccination and the
theory of vacdnosis, which I have elsewhere sought to
establish and defend. Well, I proceeded on these lines
and gave Thuja, but it did no good. I followed with
Sepia, which is a classic remedy with the homoeopaths for

28

leucorrhoea, but it ako did not help. What did I do ?
I went to the law of Homoeopathy and to the prophet
Hahnemann ! Now my patient was thirsty ; her tongue
was coated ; she had nausea ; her mouth filled with fluid ;
she had headache ; she yawned a good deal ; she had
hiccough; she complained of great weakness, and of
fatigue in all her limbs ; and altogether her symptoms
were very much like those of Cyclamen, as given in
Hahnemann’s Materia Medica Ptira, and therefore if
the old seer’s notion of similitudes was worth anything,
Cyclamen ought to cure my patient, and so it did. The
third decimsd nearly cured her, but not quite ; and so I
went down to the second decimal when the menses
appeared. But the second decimal dilution did not seem
to act so well as the previously used third, and hence
I harked back to the third. Then, as the hiccough was
not quite well, I went down to the first decimal, and then
for the same reason shot up to the tWrtieth centesimal,
when — ^repeat it only in a whisper to your friends — ^no
more remedies were needed for the hiccough ! So please
accept as my tenth reason for being a homoeopath the fact
that with its aid I can cure hiccoug h sa fely and pleasa^^ :
this ffine tbe cure was wrought witK"Cycto»»«».

I would fain b^ you to allow me to give you as my
deventh reason for being a homoeopath also a most
singular case olhiccough. It has already been published
in my Natrum muriaticum, whence I wili transcribe it.

OBS. XI. A clergyman’s wife of about 50 years of age
consulted me on February 20th, 1878, complaining of
severe dyspepsia wth other symptoms of Natrum
muriaticum. My visit was a hurried one, so I did not
^ter very fr^y into the case. Ned. mur., 6,trit., vj. grains
in water twice a day was the prescription ; it cured in
three da3rs these symptoms ; “Hiccough occurring

at le<^ tm years, w;hich was
„ hot a hiccough that made

' shobkjme body to tne ground ; it used
to ^STaBOTt ten mihutesT'aS^’wai"* vary dis&essmg
Mow do you know that the hiccougii was Yeally
produced by quinine ? I enquired. She answered :

“ At three separate times iii rny life I have taken quinine
forTic of the nglif side of my face, and I got hiccough each
|u5ae"; the "first and second time it graduafly went olf, hut
file third time it did not ; when the late Dr. H3mde
prescribed it I said, do not give me quinine as it always
gives me hiccough, but he would give it to me ; I took it,
and it gave me the hiccough, which lasted xmtil I took
your powders ; it is more than ten years ago since I took
the quinine.”

The cure of the hiccough has proved permanent.

This patient is a most truthful Christian woman, and
her statement is beyond question.

She has been a homceopath for many years, and my
patient ofi and on for more than three years, during which
time I have had to treat her for chronic sore throat,
vertigo, palpitation, and at one time for great depression
of spirits.

She had also previously mentioned her hiccough
incidentally, but I had forgotten all about it, and on this
occasion she did not even mention it ; so far as the
hiccough goes the cure was . . - . a pure fluke ! But

it set me a-thinking about the Hahnemannian doctrine of
drug dynamization for the thousandth time, and has
seriously shaken my disbelief in it.

Hiccough is a known effect of Qhinimim sulfuncumj
Allen’s Encyclopcedia, Vol. Ill, p. 226, sjraptbms 370 and
379 -

We note from this case that :

1. The effects of quinine, given for Tic in medicinal
doses to a lady, may last for more than ten years ; that :

2. Natrum muriaticum in the sixth tritnratim antidotes
this effect of quinine, while :

3. The same substance in its ordinary form, viz.,
common salt, does not antidote it even when taken daily
in various quantities and in various forms for ten years.
Inasmuch, then, as the crude substance fails to do what
the triturated substance promptly effects, it follows,
therefore, that :

4. Trituration does so alter a substance that it thereby
acquires a totally new power, and consequently that ;

5. The Hahnemannian doctrine of drug dynamization
is no myth, but a fact in Nature capable of scientific
experimental proof, and, inasmuch as the crude substance
was taken daily for many years in almost every

32

pleasantly and safely. More than a safe and pleasant
cure I ask of no system of medicine. But let me pass to
my thirteenth reason, viz. :

■ Cure of Aphonia by

A well-known soprano singer came to me with aphonia :
the throat was what is comrnonly called .,foUicular and
ingested.! You may have heard that the homceopaths
IHink a good deal of Arnica for the ill effect of bruises,
hurts, sprains, and the like ; in fact, for trauma in general.
WeU, after using numerous remedies in vain, it slowly
became manifest to me that ih&ji^honia in question was
from ^ owrstrained state of the vocal chords j\Ioreover,
mtfeht'ha^^ a small pustule con the nape, and mattery
^. pimp les on the skm.

Arnica cured the case, affording in its physiological
action symptoms similar to it.

You will perhaps say that this aphonia case is also not
a mortal malady. WUl you once for all disabuse your
mind of the very vulgar professional and popular error,
according to which the homceopaths are said to claim to
cure the incurable ! Just note, at least for your own
information, that the homceopaths make no such claim ;
what they say is this : homoeopathy cures what can be
cured much better than any other system of medicine
hitherto made known to the world. The homoeopaths do
not maintain that other systems are valueless, or that the
homoeopathic system is faultless, only that thus far in the
art-treatment of disease by remedies, homoeopathy, by
very long odds, beats all the records. Do you see ?

Be that as it may, I trust that curing an old case of
singer's aphonia with Arnica is a fairly sound reason for
being a homoeopath ; any way it is my thirteenth.

P.S. — ^When I say that homoeopathy does not claim to
cure the incurable, that leaves the question of curability
^ open one ; homoeopathy does not accept anything as
incurable because certain physicians who are " regular "
declare it to be so. Incapacity to cure does not render
the uncured incurable. Kindly take a mental note of
this, because what you “regulars” consider incurable
may, or may not, be so considered by the homoeopaths.
My old pleuritis trouble was declared and proved to be
incurable by and for the entire faculty, and yet the
Bryonia alba of the homoeopaths cured it !

33

XIV

You " do not believe that Arnica, is any good for
injuries and, moreover, it is a poisonous drug, causing
very dangerous, or, at least, very severe, erysipelas I
have nothing to do with your beliefs : clinical facts are
what I am concerned with. I cured an old case of aphonia
with Arnica, and an account of that I have sent you as my
thirteenth reason for being a homoeopath. Whether you
believe in the anti-traumatic virtues of Arnica or not is
your affair : I fearlessly affirm that your scepsis would not
have cured it, anyhow.

Further, I ^d not deny that Arnica causes very severe
and even dangerous erysipel^. indeed, I know it well,
and have seen it, and out of your own mouth will I take
my fourteenth reason for being a homoeopath.

Old Case OFt,ERYSiPELAS^CuRED ■BY\Arnicaf

Some years since an eminent member of the Society of
Friends wrote to me, stating that he had for a number of
years been suffering from>.erysipel^ of the face 'at odd
intery^s.. I ordered him Arnica in a rather high dilution
inuifrequenit dose, and thereupon his erysipelas faded
and came no more. Long afterwards he wrote me a very
grateful letter, giving me much undue praise for having
wit enough to see that the Almighty has His laws in
therapeutics for the guidance of His poor, sick children.

I have it from you that Arnica causes erysipelas ; I
will not 6.o\ibiyour statement ; you may now take it from
me that Arnica cures erysipelas, and this I offer you as my
fourteenth reason for being a homoeopath. You know
the bad character of Arnica in that it is apt to cause
erysipelas; I tell you of its good fame, viz., that it
possesses the power of curing erysipelas, and the intel-
lectual link that completes the little chain is the law of
likes that God put into the mind of one Samuel to explain
to the world.

XV

You need not be so angry at my last reason ; 1 did not
make Arnica grow in the world ; I did not endow it with
the power of causing erysipelas ; and / did not discover
the therapeutic law in question ; I just use this law in

34

order to cure my patients, even as I use the useful
invention known as a spoon wherewith to partake of my
broth. With me it is merely a means to an end ; there
is no hocus-pocus about it.

Just as I was writing you my last reason for being a
homoeopath, I was suddenly summoned by telegraph to a
very severe case of quinsy. I hastened to the suffering
damsel, and found that various remedies had been used in
vain, and the patient was, in. great distress, havi ng been
for twelve Kburs una^^ to^^^ow even a " drops p f
luST'^J^ot'even .tlie juic^of^pne ^ape would p^s, aim
sSme"bp^ativelhfbrfefehi^' seem absolutely iniper’ative.
I gave five grains of the third centesimal tritiiration of a
remedy you may not be acquainted with, but which the
heterodox homoeopaths quaintly csM^aryta carbonica, and
which is now generally known as the Carbonate of Barium.
In about a dozen hours patient ate a basin of bread and
milk. I have often cured quinsies before in the same way,
and I beg you to believe that the little trick has been
done thousands of times by others, and though no clinical
tip of mine, it nevertheless must serve you as my fifteenth
reason — and not a bad one either, as said damsel would
gratefully bear witness.

XVI

You remember my case of hiccough cured by Natrum
muriaticum? Well, while my mind is still dwelling on
this very wonderful remedy, I will adduce another cure
by it as my sixteenth reason for being a homoeopath. In
it you may again note the expansiveness of the conception
of similitudes, for this case grew out of the hiccough
case :

John H., aged 29, seaman, came to me on April 21st,
1878, telling me that he had had fever and ague two or
three times a day, with watery vomiting, in Calcutta, in
September, 1877. Was m the Calcutta Hospital three
weeks for it, and took emetics, quinine, and tonic. Left
at the end of the three weeks cured ; but before he was
out of port the ague returned, or he got another, and he
had a five-month voyage home to the port of Liverpool.
During the first three months of this homeward vo3?age he
had two, three, four and five attacks a week, and took a

35

good deal of a powder from the captain, which, from his
description, was probably Cinchona bark ; then the fever
left him, and the following condition supervened, viz. :
" Pain in right side under the ribs ; cannot lie on right
side ; both calves very painful to touch, they are hard and
stiff; left leg semiflexed, he cannot stretch it.” In this
condition he was two months at sea and two weeks
ashore ; and in this condition he comes to me hobbling
with the aid of a stick, and in great pain from the
moving.

Urine muddy and red ; bowels regular ; skin tawny ;
conjimctivse yellow.

Drinks about three pints of beer daily. I recommended
him not to alter his mode of life till he is cured, and then to
drink less beer. The former part of the recommendation
he followed, as I learned from his brother ; of the latter
part I have no information.

The hiccough case bears directly on this one, as we have
eyid^tly to do with an ague suppressed with Cincliona.
Therefore orderedd^. mur., 6 trit^ six grains in water
every four hours.

April 27th. — ^Pain in side and leg went away entirely
in three days, and the water cleared at once ; but the
pain returned on the fourth day in the left calf only,
which to-day is red, painful, swelled, and pits. He walks
without a stick.

Continue medicine.

May 4th. — ^Almost weU ; feels only a very little pain
in left calf when walking. Looks and feels quite well,
and walked into room with perfect ease without any
stick.

He thinks he had a cold shake a few nights ago. He
continues to perspire every night ; ever since he got the
ague the sheets have to be changed every night.

Continue medicine.

May nth. — Quite well.

I will here urge you to make a profound study of salt
in all its bearings ; but its being such a grand calorifacient
in refracted dose, and during this deadlock of ague and
cinchona, will surely entitle it to be considered a very good
reason for being a homoeopath, since it cannot be so used
on anv other than homceopatidc ground.

36

XVII

Not many years ago the daughter of a London alderman
was suffering from fearful neuralgia of the face ; at inter-
vals she had had it for years, and no trouble or expense
had been spared in endeavouring to cure it. Their
ordinary family adviser was a homoeopath, but he had
not managed to cure this neuralgia, notwithstanding
several constiltations with colleagues ; and other men of
eminence had been consulted, but to no avail.

I found ILat fte pain wa,s; wjrse in cold weather ; worse
at "the seaside -‘^better se,a:— inland, i.e.,

not'so freguent or severe,"an<3when the' pain came on the
eTCS watered. A pinch of the sixtfi trituration of Natrum
‘^mnaitcum m water three tunes a day cured my young
patient in about three weeks ; and this anti-neuralgic
action of iVaf. mur. must be my seventeenth reason for
being a homoeopath.

XVIII

You ask how it then is that with all the merits which I
claim for homoeopathy, its practitioners should be in
*' such a contemptible minority in the profession ” ? I
presume, being in the minority does not necessarily mean
to be in the wrong.

I suppose you hold that the world moves ? There was a
time when those who said so were in the minority, and not
very far from the stake if they dared to aver their
belief !

You personally, have devoted a good deal of attention
to " diseases of the organs of circulation ”, and you plume
yourself rather (so I gathered in conversation with you)
on knowing just a little more than most people on the
" forces that carry on the circulation of the blood ” — eh ?
Was not, once upon a time, the nickname ” circulator ” —
one who bdieved in Harvey’s discovery — a very oppro-
brious epithet indeed in our “ liberal profession ? ” quite
as bad as “ hommopath ” now ; and did I one day not
hear a great prator bring down the house by exclaiming,
“ They are slaves who dare not be in the right with two
or three ” ? Your " minority ” argument is worn out.

Well, I wrote you the last time but one about the
power of Nairum muriaiicum, zud you would

37

like to know whether it acts upon a certain centre. I do
not know its seat of action exactly, but I do know that
it can often make a cold, chilly person feel warm ; and
that is no small thing.

Some years since I was attending one of the children of
a widow in the neighbourhood of London, and having
made a pretty good therapeutic hit — homceopathically, my
friend ! — she said she should like to consult me on her
own account for her nerves ; and when we had gone into
that matter, she said, " Ah, I suppose it is no use to consult
you about my .cold shivering fits ; no one can do them any
good.” They were in this wise ; on going to bed a,t night
she began to shudder and sMyer.'aiid on getting into bed
in4 ijHng^ doym, she would shive r t o such a d^ee that
her teeth chattered, and the mbyemenTs oThTer body shop^
i&e b^. She had suffered this for years, and had been
mider'a number of physicians for these cold shivers, but
no one had ever touched them. She named five well-
known homoeopathic practitioners who had in vain tried
their hand at it ; one of these has since renounced
homoeopathy and all its ways, and previously he had
tacitly given up the use of dynamized remedies, and loves
now to ridicule them. Still for all that, and all that,
djmamized Natrum muriaticum cured these cold shakes
promptly and permanently. Long afterwards this lady
wrote that she kept a bottle of the medicine on her bed-
room mantelpiece au besoin, or as we physicians so neatly
put it, pro re nata, but never needed it.

■ J call Natrum muriaiicum my calorifacient. Try it !

XIX

Yes, you are quite right in sa 5 dng that our Natrum
muriaticum is your Sodium chloride, the common salt of
our tables, and I am not at all surprised to learn that you
cannot believe that it is in any sense a medicine. Many
homceopathic practitioners are of the same opinion — ^but
bah ! what have your and their beliefs to do with hard
clinical facts ? I have cured no inconsiderable number of
cases of disease with Natrum muriaticum — chfiliness,
swelled spleens, gout, constipation, and, above all,
neuralgias ; so what does it matter to me what you or
they think about it ? I know.

38

Now I would like to cite one more experience of mine
with Nairum muriaticum, which, besides being very
curious, is also practically important, and then I will not
trouble you further with my attic salt !

I can give it you in a very few words. A lady, wife of
an officer, came over from India to be under my care.
The difficulty in her case lay in this, that she was to stop
with her husband’s friends, who have a lovely place near
the sea, in Sussex, but it usually upset her so much that
she could not stay there. “ And you know," said she,
“ it is so very tmfortunate for I can stay there for nothing,
and have the use of a carriage, and everything is so very
nice ; and yet I am obliged to decline going there, and
have to go to nasty lodgings by myself, which of course
I have to pay for." Why c^ you not live at your
husband’s place ? " Oh ! it is. the sea ; I am just the
same on board ship, dreadfully iU.”

"*^Vell, the burden of "miy "song is just this — Natrum
muriaiicum, 6 trit., so modified this lady’s state that she
was not only able to stay at said place, but actually
thereat enjoyed being and sitting by the sea.

This is my nineteenth reason for being a homoeopath,
and if you will accept it, I will promise you not to trouble
you with an3d:hing more about the Chloride of Sodium, or
Natrum muriodicum, as it is called by the homoeopaths.

XX

If I had not promised to say no more about Natrum
muriaticum, I should have liked to narrate to you a very
interesting case cured by it — a case of very severe head-
^he — ^but I must keep my promise. I may, however,
just say that the lady is the patient of a medical man,
both living near one another at the seaside, said gentleman
having given himself some trouble to ridicule my pub-
lished observations on the effects of Natrum muriaticum —
for all that Nat. mur. cured the lady.

Telle est la vie — m^dicale.

The young wife of a country squire came to me, at the
beaming of the suinmer of 1887, with' severe headache ,
»i.at the back, ?that haH made her life sour fo r.agQ od twelve-
m.onth : ^ejlwa;^ ; .^it w^ Sd

%^ 4 ^^^tlit e'mei^^jlh e also had hehffhrffie^ Left

39

\ovary a little swelled and tendei^ Thuja occidentalis in a
rather high dilution and in infrequent dose cured her
right off. She waited three months to see if the cure was
real, and then wrote me a grateful letter of thanks. Please
let this cephalalgia, cured by. Thuja 30, be my twentieth
reason for being a homoeopath'

XXI

You say “ your letters lately would seem to be intended
to show how very superior your homoeopathy is to that of
your co-practitioners ”.

Well, that was certainly not my intention, but rather
to show that people’s beliefs have often nothing to do with
facts ; for instance, you allopaths ridicule homoeopathy,
but that system of medicine is true all the same. Many
practitioners of homoeopathy ridicule some of the most
brilliant clinical triumphs of the very system they belong
to. In both cases the error is the same ; they both
childishly suppose that their powers are the limits of the
possible. I was merely tr3dng to show the fallaciousness
of their judgment ; and this is important, as the greatest
enemies of homoeopathy are often its own weak-kneed or
incompetent practitioners. To explain what I mean
more fully, let me give you as my twenty-first reason a
case of

i^ENORRHAGIA/br FIFTEEN YeARS’ STANDING CURED BY
'Phosphorus

The lady was 51 years old, and so you may call it
metrorrhagia if you so prefer, but there had been no break
in the.mOTseSj^ whi<± ^ re^ar. She came to me
m October, 1082, 'an<i told me of her trouble, and that it
dated from a mi^arriage fifteen years befoj!^ ,She ,ha 3
^ten flooded at Her confinements. Phosphorus 200 cured
fier. " She went much smaller in the“wais.t, and told me
she " felt like a young girl ”. She had other intercurrent
remedies — Lachesis, Ferrum, Thuja and Arnica, but it was
the Phosphorus that cured the haemorrhage, I having to
return to it three separate times, with rnonths betw;een,
and the last time I used Phosi looth potency.

Now I cite this caise because it is purely and exquisitely
homoeopathic, and yet the bulk of the homoeopathic

40

practitioners in the world do not believe in what are
called high dilutions, and for all that this case was cured
by such dilutions. It follows that either they or I must
be mistaken ; the lady who was thus cured would laugh in
your face if you were to ask her to believe that she received
from me other than very powerful remedies. And,
indeed, they were very powerful. And just think of the
gallons of Steel Drops and tonics that she had had in vain
during those fifteen years of bleeding !

XXII

You teU me you are much mistaken in me, for you had
always thought I was, “for a homoeopath a very big
doser ! ’’ and that the Phosphorus I once mixed in a
tumbler for your aunt actually “ smoked ! ”

Perfectly true ; I cannot discuss homoeopathic (or, if
you wUl, my) posology with you, but I will give you my
rule, viz. : The dose depends upon the degree of similitude *
the greater the similitude the higher the dilution, and the
less "frequent the administration ; the smaller the degree
of similitude the lower the dose and the more frequent the
repetitions of the dose. My own range of dose is from a
few globules of the two-hundreth dilution at eight days'
intervals, down to ten drops of the mother tincture (of
weak drugs, of course) four times a day.

The dose is often quite as important as the remedy, and
your exclusively low, as well as the exclusively high
dilutionists, are only one-eyed practitioners, though of
course kings among the blind, i.e. the allopaths.

It is your fault that I have touched upon the vexed
question of the dose, that is to homoeopathy what the
everlasting Irish question is in British politics.

My twenty-second reason for being a homoeopath is
one I published some years ago under the heading

Case oe Exostosis 'of Right Os Calcis Cured by
Heclae lava

Dr. Garth Wilkinson went once to Iceland for a holiday,
and observed that the animus whifch fed in the pastures
J^fire &e fcer ashes of Mount Hecla f^, suffered from
imrofaise m a sd il a ry and other exostoses. Bang an

41

adherent of the scientific system of medicine founded for
us by Samuel Hahnemann, he brought some Heclae lava
home with him, and it has been already successfully used
to cure affections similar to those which it is capable of
causing.

On July 3rd, 1880, a young lady, aged 15, came under
my observation with an exostosis on her right os calcis,
somewhat smaller and a little flatter than half a walnut-
shell. It was at times painful., Patient was in other
respects in good health and well nourished, but.her tee^
were not very sound. She goes blue in winter, and suffers
^o very' badly from chilblains both on hands and feet,
wprse on hands.

'' R Trit. 2 Heclae Montis lavae, 5 iv.

S — Six grains three times a day.

17th. The exostosis is decidedly smaller; it never
pains now.

Pergai.

September 25 th . The exostosis has entirely disappeared ;
the two heels being compared, no difference between them
can now be discovered.

Heclae lava has been shown to consist of silica, alumina,
calcium and magnesia, wiffi some ferric oxide. We are,
therefore, not astonished that it can cause and cure
exostosis.

Brother allopath, this is science in therapeutics ; what
have you to take its place ? Give absorbents and paint
the part with iodine ? What guarantee can you give me
that your absorbents will not absorb a bit of the pancreas
or some small glands in lieu of the exostosis ?

Or you are, also, true to your principle : Contraria
contrariis curantur ? Then pray tell me what is the
contrary of an exostosis ?

XXIII

Referring to my remarks in my last letter but one, that
so many of the practitioners of homoeopathy do not
believe in the so-called high dilutions, I should like to
add a word or two, as I see by your reply (only just to
hand) that you have mistaken my meaning. I do not
mean that none of the homoeopathic physicians believe
in said dilutions, but that only a small minority of them.

42

perhaps about one-fourth in this country. Furthermore,
my cure of haemorrhage with Phosphorus is not only “ an
isolated case of the kind ”, but only one of a large number ;
in fact, scores of such cases were published in homoeo-
pathic literature long years before I knew anything about
the subject. You evidently forget that I am precluded
from getting my reasons from our literature.

And in case you might also think the same limitedness
applies to the use of Heclae lava, in exostosis, I may say
that you can find other cases in our literature more
striking than this one of mine, and— lest you should say
faith did it— a Dublin physician cured his horse of a large
exostosis with the same remedy ! As my twenty-third
reason for being a homoeopath let me cite a

'.Case oli C ranial ExostosisXured -BY -Aurum tnet ..

The case was published long ago, and so I will not
trouble you with details : suf&ce it tp say, that the man
who ha.d the bony growth in Ws skull was completely and
permanently cured by me with Metallic Gold in homoeo-
' pathic preparation. Nor is this an isolated case of the
kind; the thing has been done oft before, any time
during the last fifty years, and even before that.

XXIV

I am very anxious to show the difference between curing
a case empirically and doing so scientifically — that is to
say, homoeopathically ; and a paper I once published on
Ardia will do this, and also be my twenty-fourth reason
for being a homoeopath. I choose this because you seem
to think my singly given cases " isolated ”.

";The Cough of Arcdia-:

Ardia racemosa is not an accepted homoeopathic
remedy, and Dr. Allen did not insert Dr. Jones’s little
proving in his Encydopaiia, but he has put it into the
Appendix.

Dr, Hughes has also now added it to the list in his
well-known Pharmacodynamics, but only as a supple-
mentary remedy. So it seems to be just timidly peeping
into our big drug-house. I know of no clinical experience
with it beyond what we find in Hale’s Thevapmiics.

43

It appears that the plant has a great reputation in the
United States as a ^cough me^cin^and Professor E. M.
Hale very properly says that this Warrants us in expecting
that it has at least some specific affinity for the respiratory
organs. The common people have in some way found
out that the “ spikenard ” is good for coughs ; Hale
comes and makes a note of it. A step farther is made
by Dr. S. A. Jones, who made a proving of it in 1870,
and thus lifted the popular cough medicine out of useful
empiricism on to the scientific basis of Hahnemann’s
induction.

I happened to read Jones’s proving in Hale’s New
Remedies some six or seven years ago, and I was much
struck with the character of the cough. I fancy the thing
that helped to impress it upon my mind was the fact that
I had had just at that period a kdy under niy care
was suffering f torn a cough ^arcame on .^fer l^ down
at night. I had been tinkering away at this cough, and
could riot cure it ; so I blamed the damp house in which
the lady resided, and its proximity to a brook prettily
hidden among the willows close by. Hyoscyamus, Digi-
talis, and a number of other remedies came into play, but
the cough would not budge a bit. Need I tell the heart-
rending tale that the patient lost faith in her doctor (the
writer) and in his much-vaunted pathy, and set about
healing herself with quack medicines and orthodox
sedative cough mixtures ? Of course I felt humiliated,
and I therefore made up my mind to read my Materia
Medica a little more diligently. It was quite evident that
the cough was a curable one, for the most careful physical
examination failed to detect an3rthing besides a few moist
rales that tallied with the moderate amount of expectora-
tion.

Failures are very instructive at times.

Just after having received my conge from this lady, I
was reading Hale’s New Remedies, and came across Dr.
S. A. Jones’s proving oi^ralia racemosa,: where he says :

“ At 3 p.m. I took ten drops of the mother tincture in
two ounces of water. An interesting book caused me to
forget my ' dose ’. The events of the night jogged my
memory very effectually.”

He goes on to say that he retired to rest at midnight,
fe^ng as w^ell as evejc, but he " had no sooner lain down
than he was seized with a fit of asthma ”.

44

I put down the book — ^Hale’s New Remedies was not
quite so thick then as it is now— and said to myself,
" That’s Mrs. N’s cough, that is just how she does. She
lies down and forthwith begins to cough, to get laboured
breathing, and to make’ her poor hard-toiling husband
TOSb he were a bachelor " : at least he might have wished
it, for ought I know to the contrary.

A little time elapsed, and the writer was sent for to see
one of this coughing lady’s children with eczema. The
bairn’s common integument having been prescribed for,
I timidly inquired about the cough. “ Oh,” said Mrs. N.,
" it is as bad as ever ; I have tried everything, and do not
know what to do.” I sat down and wrote :

B=\rc. Aralia racemosa 2 j axid. it cured citd, tutd, et
jucume, and that not because Aralia is good for coughs,
and has an affinity for the respiratory organs merely, but
because it is capable of causing a cough hke the one that
was to be cured.

This happened somewhere about six or seven years ago,
and I have since cured this kind of cough with Aralia
whenever I have come across it, and at a rough guess I
should say that would be thirty or forty times.

Case II. — Tussis Araliae. — A. lady came imder my
observation last summer. She resides in the West End
of London, and had been rmder competent homoeopathic
treatment for her throat, and had certainly derived benefit,
but still her cough did not leave her, so that she was on
the point of removing from London and going to the
South, whereof she is a native, she and her friends having
become apprehensive lest her chest should become affected.
Her cough was not identical with Mrs. N’s, but the only
. difference ms that it did not come on till after a first sleep
of not long duration. Patient would go to bed quite
well (so did Mrs. N., and so did Dr. S. A. Jones) and lie
^wn and go to sleep, and after a short sleep, would wake
with a severe fit of cqugEihg that would last an hour or
more.

'X^alia 3 cured it entirely, in a few days, and she gave up

all idea of returning to the South.

C<ise III. — Tussis Araliae. — ^A child of not quite six gets
croupy coughs in damp weather that usually 3neld to
Dulcamara^ OccasionaUy, however, there remains the
f kind of nocturnal cough described in Case II, viz., she w ill
I &p io ^ d, lie down, fall off to deep, and presently awaKS

45

with a violent bout of coughing. Originally, before
taffnking of Aralid, I had in vain given Hyostyamm,
Gelsemium, Aconitum, Spongia, Hepar, Dulcamara,
Phosphorus, and Bryonia. Then t^ e^lj^npctu:^,
character of toe cough detemmed nielb try Arma^^a^
vntb prompt effect.

‘ "t^ase V^.—Tussis Araliae. — ^An asthmatic gentleman of
50 years of age, with moderate emphysema of toe lungs,
has long been under my care. At first he was almost
always short of breath on exertion, and had bad npctunx^
attacks o^dyspnoea and cough/ A prolonged course of
constitutiorial treatment has at last partially cured him,
but when he catches a cold he gets an attack of bronchial
catarrh with early nocturnal cough.

It would be tedious to give the treatment of his whole
case, but it will suffice to say it consisted principally of
antipsorics and hepatics.

One day this gentleman said he wished I could give him
a mScine/of his cough, to have by his bedside at night,
Because otherwise when he caught cold (as at this time) he
would go to bed quite weU, fall asleep, and presently
awake with a violent fit of asthma that would last from
one to two hours, more or less ; then he would get up a
little phlegm and go to sleep again.

I prescribed one-drop powders at Ar alia ^x. pro re nata.
The next time I had occasion to see this gentleman he
exclaimed, " I thought those powders would have kfiled
me. I took one as you directed, when my cough became
much more violent than I had ever known it, but it soon
ceased, ^d. has never returned.”'

He keeps some of these powders by his bedside ever
since, and on various occasions they have helped him,
thus far unfailingly. He has not had an aggravation
since toe first time of using them.

These cases are samples only, but they teach a useful
lesson : to give more than these would be irksome.

It will be seen that l^aAa^'altoough a new remedy, is a
comparatively old friend' of mine, and I can confidently
commend it iox \early nocturnal cough -ihAi occurs either
immediately on lying down,, or more commonly after a
> first fore-midnightly sleep.

Professor Samuel Jones’s cough was immediately after
he had lain down, but it will be noted that he did not retire
till midnight, whereas aU my patients, I believe, went to

46

bed before. From a fairly extensive experience of Aredia
as a cough remedy I have formed the conclusion that it
is homoeopathic to its cough by reason of its time and
patient’s recumbent position.

It is w good, I believe, in cough occurring at any time
on lying down, neither does it avail in a cough caused by
a relaxed uvula ; neither will it, as far as I am aware,
cure any lung lesion whatsoever beyond bronchial irrita-
tion and catarrh. And most positively it is no good at all
in the after-midnightly or 2 or 3 a.m. dyspnoea and cough
of genuine asthma. In such cases I have given it in vain.
But for the previously described variety of cough it is a
remedium probatissimum. Here, for the thousandth time,
we see the exactness of our homoeopathic science. In
conclusion, my thanks to Professor Hale for introducing
my now dear friend, Aralia, and my still greater gratitude
to Professor Samuel Jones for the more intimate scientific
acquaintance. As homoeopaths we owe a deep debt of
gratitude to drug provers.

XXV

It may be about three years ago, or thereabouts, that
it was my duty to give an opinion on the state of a
gentleman of middle age, resident in London, and who
was considered in a d3nng state. He had not much faith
in any medical man, or in any pathy, and had for years
wandered from one physician to another for his serious
heart disease and frightful dyspepsia. The allopaths did
him most good, he thought, on the whole, with their
remedies, but the good effects did not last. The pre-
scriptions showed that his state had been correctly
diagnosed, and not badly treated from their stand-
point. He received in turns cordials, iodides, antacids
and tonics, but his disease-»-^eurysm of the aorta— got^
worse.

The homoeopaths had treated him symptomatically—*
and he had plenty of s3mptoms — and once or twice he
really thought he was cured for a day or two, but then he
became suddenly as bad as ever — ^his aneurysm evidently
got larger.

When I first saw him he seemed almost moribund, and
had received the last rites of the Church.

47

After going over his case well, and taking into account
the state of his tissues and organs and. the size of his
aneurysm, so far as that could be determined, I gave as
my opinion that he might slowly get better, and b
eventually cured of his disease.

That gentleman has since married, and the aneuiyaor
though not yet quite gone, is slowly yielding to homoeo
pathic treatment, freely applied under diagnostic common-
sense.

The principal remedies were Aurum met , Chelidmium
majus, Carduus, Ceanothus, Glandium quercus, Aconitum.
Ferrum, Cactus grand., and Baryta muriatica, the firai
named and the four last being directly — specifically—
curative. My knowledge of the use of Barium, is due W
Dr. Flint, and this is not the first or second time that
homoeopathy has cured aneurysm.

I saw my patient walking along the street a few days
since with his wife, and I was quite struck with his healthy,
ruddy appearance. This power of homoeopathy over
aneurysm gives my twenty-fifth reason for being a
homoeopath — ^and that lands me just half-way with my
fifty reasons. Have you thus far conceived any greats
respect for homoeopathy, or can you explain my
reasons away ? At least you are beginning to see that
my statement at your uncle’s house was not boastfulness,
but a mere statement of fact. Pray understand that I
am not the least desirous of making you, or anybody else,
a homoeopath ; it makes no difference whatever to me.
Nor does it make any difference to truth : truth will get
on very well without any of you.

Nor do I anticipate any particular good from all this
scribbling of my fifty reasons to you ; I do it just to
substantiate my own position, and slap the jeering
ignorance of orthodoxy in the face.

XXVI

You complain that I indulge in too much abuse, and
that I am unnecessarily pugnacious and offensive.
Perhaps so. Did you not have the impertinence to call
the homoeopaths quacks ? You who know nothing about
what they do ! and do not you allopaths, every man of
you, go about day by day and slander the homoeopaths ?

48

You allopaths bear false witness against your homoeo-
pathic neighbours every day of your lives — did I not once
hear you say to your aunt at table, “ Oh, yes, Auntie, take
some of your little homoeopathic pilules, they won’t
hurt!”

You said I must give you my fifty reasons out of my own
life’s work, as I had promised, or “ come down the tree

Well, I sit firmly on a very big bough of the old tree
of truth, and it is not an ignorant allopath who will ever
dislodge me.

It may be half a dozen years ago that an unusually
beautiful, sweet girl, a good way in her twenties, residing
in an important provincial town, was noticed tp fade and
get weak, with peculiar ill-defined tEroat symptoms,^y^ak-
ness m'hef back, r^tal and uterine 'irritation,"weakness
Mdr emaciafi'on." People cotild hot think what had come
over her. She is one of those human highbreds who will
not cave in, but, if duty calls, will go on till they drop :
M then, existing on their “go” rather than on their
ph5^que.

In life they are commonly misunderstood, and because
they can put on a spurt or clear a very high-fenced
difficulty au besoin, the ui^nowing and non-observant
think they are really *^rdng, but are lazy or sham.

Oil I she nursed her nieces for weeks and never had
her clothes off, but did not seem to mind a bit, and now
die would have you believe she is so delicate ; she shams,
it's all put on.” But it is not put on at all; if you
. examine their heads you will find thAanimal sphere|&lm6st
^ntirely absent/ ” ■

' Df; R* M. ituttle, speaking on this point, says :

“ Some men can do with ease as much physical labour
as would kiU other men. The same is true of mental
labour. A man like Gladstone can take on himself a
course of work the mere attempting of which would
effectually silence any one else. He is a man with a large,
highly organized brain, but he possesses, besides, the well-
b^anced organs of animal hfe which are required to
generate the energy that such brains can transmute into
intdlectual force. To be able to do the full measure of
work of a m^, it is necessary to be a good animal."

The lady in question has the most exquisitely intel-
lectual development, a wonderful arch of cerebrum, but
no occipital power worth while.

49

Well, the patient had been through a domestic trial
and had bent ; some thought she had broken.

A good, kind, gentle allopathic physician, who was wont
to attend the family, also attended her, and diagnosed
Bi;ight’s disease of the kidneys. Said he to her mother :

"1 am truly sorry to have to tell you that Miss has

a disease of the kidneys that cannot be cured ; you must
take care of her ; she must wear flannel all over, and avoid
cold and damp ; she may last with care a very long time,
but you must not expect her to get well.”

Much family council was held together, and the outlook
being dark and hopeless, the young lady was brought
to me.

Homoeopathy cured her in about eight months, and
the young lady thereupon got married, and has now several
bouncing chil^en, and she herself continues in good health.
Not a vestige of albumen has been in the urine for nearly
five years. What cured her ? Mercurius vims. She
took two doses a day for many months. I did not hit it
i!^'f"b^''but''fned two'of’'ffiee reme^es at first without
avail.

This is my twenty-sixth reason for being a homoeopath,
and it alone were amply sufficient : and whether it be
God's will that I die to-night, or live for another fifty
years, I feel that while I do live I am in duty bound
to fight the good fight of homoeopathy with all the
power I possess ; were I to do less I should be afraid to
die.

Young man, the responsibility of not being a homoeopath
is very terrible.

XXVII

Post-Orbital Neuralgia of Twenty Years’ Standing

Must be my twenty-seventh reason for being a homoeo-
path. This case (which came under observation on
January 9th, 1882), is one of considerable interest on
various accounts. Its subject, a lady of rank, over fifty
years of age, had been in turns, and for many years, imder
almost aH the leading oculists of London for this neuralgia
of the eyes — ^i.e. terrible pain at the back of the eyes^

50

on in paroxysms, and confining her to her ropm for
many days together some attacks would last for six
weeks. Some of the neurdgic pain, however, remained
at Bmes.' "Her eyes had been examined by almost
every notable oculist in London, and no one could find
anything wrong with them structurally, so it was unani-
mously agreed and declared to be nswcilgiu of the fifth
nerve. Of course no end of tonics, anodynes, and altera-
tives had been used. The oculists sent her to the physi-
cians, and these back again to the oculists. The late
Dr. Quin and other leading homoeopaths had been tried,
but, “ no one had ever touched it

Latterly, and for years, she had tried nothing ; when-
ever an attack came on, she would remain in her darkened
bedroom, with her head tied up, bewailing her fate. To
me she exclaimed, " My existence is one life-long cruci-
fixion I ”

I should have stated that, the nemalgia was preceded
and jiccompanied by influenza. In the aggregate these
attacks of influeMa and post-orbital neuralgia confined
her to her room nearly half the year. In appearance she
was healthy, weU-nourished, rather too much embon-
point, and fairly vigorous. A friend of hers had been
benefited by homoeopathy in my hands, and she therefore
came to me “ in utter despair ”.

These are the simple facts of the case, though they
look very like piling up the agony 1 Now for the remedy.
The resources of allopathy had been exhausted, and,
moreover, I have no confidence in them an3way : homoeo-
pathy — and good homoeopathy too, for the men tried
knew their work — ^had also failed. Do-nothing, now
much in vogue, had fared no better. I reasoned thus :
This lady teUs me she has been, vaccinated/five or six
times, and being thus very much vaccinated, she may be
just suffering from chronic vaccindsisi one chief symptom,;
of which is a^^hd^^a^ke hers, so I forthwith pre-
scribed T huja fi, 6 . " TT cured, and the cure has lasted till
now. TSe nSnalgia disappeared slowly; in about six
weeks (February 14th, 1882) I wrote in my case-book,
" The eyes are well I ”

As I have not heard from the patient for some time, I
am just writing a note to her to know whether the neural-
gia has thus far (December 30th, 1882) returned. The
reply I will add.

51

Of course, it does not follow that because Thuja cured
this case of neuralgia of some twenty years’ standing,
that therefore the lady was suffering from vaccinosis ;
that Thuja did cure it is incontrovertible, and my vac-
cinosis hypothesis led me to prescribe it. More cannot
be maintained. At least, the case must stand as a clinical
triumph for Thuja 30 — ^this much is absolute.

In reply to my enquiry, I received the following :

" January xst, 1883.

" . . . I have been in very much stronger health

ever since I crossed your threshold, and excepting one or
two attempts at a return from the enemy, I have been
quite free from suffering . . .”

This lady continues well of her post-orbital neuralgia
at the time of going to press. After the disappearance
of the neuralgia she had several other remedies from me
for dyspeptic s3rmptoms.

"xxvin^

Let this reason be a case of —

■^HRONIC HEADACHg^F NiNE YeARS’ DURATION

Miss G — , aet. 19, came under my care on March 12th,
1881, complaining of bad attacks of headache for the past
nine years. She said it was as if the back of her head
were in a vice, and then it would be frontal, and throbbing
as if her head would burst. She was very pale, and her
forehead looked shiny, and in places brown.

These “ head attacks ” occurred once or twice a week.
\ ^nd ency to constipation/ menses regular; ^ old
pa left eyelid ; 'poor appetite ; dislikes" flesh-
feat ; liver eidarged a little.; had a feies of boils in the
fail of 1880.

-,:Feet cold used to have cMblains. Fo r ye ars cannot
ride in an omrubus or lii'a cab',' because oTgeft'm^'are''ffid
•, ^n^B^omes rpu^" m" the’ vnhd ';",lips crack ■ "gets

vfenty at times./ " '

To hav^ Gr^Mtes 304

April — ^Appetite and spirits better, but otherwise

no change. Questioned as to the duration of the head

52

attacks, she tells me the last but one continued for three
vyeeks— the last, three days. Over the right eye there
is a red, tender patch ; has two w three white-headed
pustules . on her face.

■ Was vaccinated , at three months, re-vaccinated at
sev'^ yems, ’ anci agm^ at fourteen. Had small-ppx
about ten years ago.

‘Kus here was a case that had had small-pox ten years
ago, or thereabouts, for she could not quite fix the date,
and had been vaccinated three times besides, once sub-
sequent to the small-pox !

B Tc. Thuja occidentalis,

To take five drops in water twice a day.

May 13th . — Much better ; has only had one very slight
headache lasting an hour or two ; the frontal tender
patch is no longer tender ; no further faintness at all. Lips
crack. The pustules on the face gone, and skin quite

" To haveVTAM/a i3/one drorlat bedtime/

June i7l:-WtlSen' i^ with

soreness of stomach ; fever ; nausea and perspiration.
Subsequently spots broke out like pimples — eight on the
face; one each on the thumb and wrist, one on the foot,
^d two on the back ; they fiUed with matter, were out
five days, became yellow, and then died away. Her
mother says the s5miptoms were just the same as when
patient had the small-pox. Her headaches were well just
before this bout came on.

July 1st . — Continues weU.

July z'jth . — ^The headaches have not returned.

February Zijh, 1882. — ^The cure holds good, for she has
had no headache, and is otherwise well. She had sub-
sequently some other remedies for the little tumour on her
eyelid, and for a small exostosis on lower jaw, but ^e h^
received nqttog but Thuja wh.en jhe cephalal^a dis-
aOTeare<i,' and’ it was two or three' weeks before the next
m^^Ee" followed.

Some months after this date this young lady was
brought by her mother merely to show me how well she
was, and to take final leave of me ; two years later I
learned from her mother that she continued well, so the
cure is permanent.

interesting feature in this case is the curious attack
which came on at the beginning of June. My reading

53

of it is that it was really a proving of Thuja, or a general
organismic reaction called forth by it ; and this sent me
often up to the thirtieth dilution in my subsequent u^ of
Thuja, though I have occasionally found the "third
decimal dilution answer better than the thirtieth.

But this is not the point of my thesis, for this case was
cured by the low dilution, and when the low dilutions cure,
and cure promptly, even thougli not yery.a^eeably, but
well, it cannot be necessary to go up any higher, especially
as one’s faith is sufficiently on the stretch without it.

XXIX

..Enlarged Glands. .Apex-Catarrh

Master C — , aet. ii|, came under my care on August
i8th, i88i, .complaining of . a co ugh, worse at 7.30 p.m. ;
he also coughed by day and through the night, but it did
not wake him. ' Hel^erspired fearfuUjj/wors^on the head/
arid worse|during theTiighty Over upper half of left lung
one heard ihoist crackling The cervical lymphatic

glands at the top of the apex of left lung were indurated,
and distinctly “ feelable ”. He weighed 5 stone 4 lbs.
The vaccination scars were on the left arm, and the glands
over the apex of the right lung were not indurated.
Induration of the lymphatics on the left side of the neck
(the vaccinating being performed on that side) is the rule
after vaccination, as anyone may observe for himself
if he will take the trouble to examine a healthy child just
before vaccination and any time thereafter. I say, any
time thereafter, for the thing generally persists for a very
long time, unless cured by medical art.

3q/w. ii. Sac. lac. q.s. Fiat pulv. Tales
xxiv.'''^ne,"l 3 iree times a day^

August 2 yth. — is well of cough, but the sweats con-
tinue. To take no medicine.

September 6 th. — ^The most careful examination of chest
reveals no rale ; there is no cough ; the sweats have quite
ceased ; the said cervical lymphatics can not be found.
The boy now weighs 5 stone 8 lbs., so that he has gained
4 lbs. in weight since he got the Thuja.
discharged cured.

The boy had been at school, and was sent home to his
parents by the school physician on account of his obstinate
cough, and because his general symptoms excited alarm.
To me it appeared to be the first stage of phthisis. That
the boy should increase in weight at home just after return-
ing from school is, of course, not necessarily due to the
medicine ; home life, too, would improve his nutrition
generally, and would perhaps also account for the dis-
appearance of the apex-catarrh, cough, and perspirations.
But what is to account for the disappearance of the
induration of the cervical glands ?’

XXX

Of course you will perceive that what I understand by
vaccinosis has no necessary connection with homoeopathy,
the Thuja being homoeopathic to the cases.

As my thirtieth reason for being a homoeopath you will
allow me to cite another Thuja case, — viz. one of

^Acne^i^Face and Nose/ani\Nasai, Dermatitis/

A yoimg lady, about twenty years of age, was brought
by her mother to me on October 28th, 1882. Patient
had a very red, pimply nose, not like the red nose of the
^derly bibber, or like that due to dyspepsia or to tight
lacing, but a pimply, scaly, nasal dennadtis, which
extended froitTI he cuta neous covering of tbe nose to that
^^e cheeiS, _bur^ppearing' here more "as'^^ciM acne.
TSe nas^ dermaStis“was, roughly, in the form of a saddle.
Of course, this state of things in an otherwise pretty girl
of twenty was painfully and humiliatingly unpleasant to
her and to her friends ; in fact, it was likely to mar her
future prospects very materially, more especially as it had
already existed for six years, and was making no signs
of departing. She also complained of obstinate constipa-
tion. The pitnples of the nose and face used to get little
white mattery heads.

B {Thuja occidentalis 30.,=

Noven^er ^oih . — ^Pimples of face decidedly better.
Nose less red. Constipation no better.

B Thuja occidentalis 100.

January jjrd, 1883. — ^The face is free ! Her mother
gratefully exclaims, “ She is wonderfully better." I ask

55

the young lady which powders did her most good ; she says,
" The last" The skin of the nose is normal, but the
constipation is no better, and for this she remains under
treatment.

That Thuja cured this case is incontrovertible.

XXXI

Neuralgia of Right Eye

Mr. — , a gentleman of position and means, about fifty
years of age, came to consult me on June 28th, 1882, for a
neuralgia of the right eye.

He complained of almost\constmt pain in right eye/
ever since Christmas 1881, i'e^'^ust about six months.
Had had neuralgia in head and shoulders in 1866, and so
much morphia had been injected in his shoulders by a
doctor in Scotland that it almost HUed him : for seven
or eight hours it was doubtful if he would recover.

Has s^broym, eczematous^itchy (at night X eru ptiona^n
^offi shi^"and betweennEBe tpe;^ The neural^ ol fight
eye", ah(i for which he comes to me, is bad both day and
night, but rather worse at night. Mr. (now Sir William)
Bowman had examined the eye and declared it to be
neuralgia, the eye being norm^. Mr. White Cooper had
done the same.

On my enquiring when he was last vaccinated, he seemed
completely frightened, and stammered out rapidly, " I
. should not like to be vaccinated again.”

“ Why ? ”

" I_ was very seedy the last time I was vaccinated ;
in fact, I felT awfully ill for about a month,” and he again
huifiedly protested that he would not like to be vaccinated
again. The vaccination that had made him so ill was
either in 1852 or 1853.

This seemed to me to be a case of|vaccinal neuralgia^:-
and therefore I oxd&XQd. ' Thuja infrequent dose".

This was on June 28th, 18B2. "

July Sth . — But very little pain after the first powder.
To have the same medicine again.

The cure proved permanent, and is interesting as proof
of the rapidity with which the most like remedy can cure
a neuralgia.

56

XXXII

Being a case of

Diseased Finger-Nails

On December 22nd, 1882, a young lady of twenty-six
came under my care for an ugly state of the n^ls of her
fingers. Naturally, a lady* of her ’ age would hot' be
inherent to the state of her nails. These nails are in-
dented rather deeply, and in addition to these indentations
there are black patches on “the under surface of the nails,
re^mg into the ^uick/ JV'ery shght ieucorf^

'^ nflfl y.' She'haJTcIucken-pox as a child of elev'ra/'^
her shoulders there is" an eruption of roundish palches,'
forming mattery heads'. ' The black patches have existed
these eighteen months.

'■^f'oldered^Ajijia i^on^ in six).

March igfl, 1833. — Has continued the Thuja 30 for just
about three months, with the result that wiAin a fortnight
from commencing with it the black patches under the nails
“^gan to disappe^, and there is now no trace of them.

I will not trouble you with any more reasons based on
the therapeutic action of Thuja.

You want to know whether I really claim that homoeo-
pathy can cure cataract with medicines. You know very
well that that has been my contention for a number of
years ; but I will revert to that again.

XXXIII

As my thirty-third reason for being a homoeopath I
propose to give you a case of cataract .bured by medicines.
You said in one of your letters to me that you would like
to see the man who could dissolve a case of genuine senile
cataract with medicines. Well, I will recount to you how
I was converted myself.

The limits of th e curable ^d of the incurable are not
jreg^Sted bjy’^y"hxe 3 lines ; what is incurable to-da.y ,
" may 'b e curable td-mbrtbwrahd what we all of this gener-
^dn deeni incurable "may be considered very amenable
to treatment in the next generation.

When walking the hospitals years ago I was taught,
in respect of cataract, that there was nothing for it but an

57

operation ; a few months since, I spent a little timeiHfeM
excellent metropolitan hospital for the eye, and fonnd that
that is still the one thing taught, — viz. if you have a
cataract, there is no hope for you beyond that of getting
blind, and then trying to get your sight again by having
the cataractous lens removed.

On May 28th, 1875, 1 was sent for to see a lady suffering
from, acute ophthalmi a. She informed me that her friend
Dr. mSony, of^verpool, had recommended her to try
homoeopathy when she should again require medical aid, ,
and had also mentioned my name to her. She seemed
rather ashamed of calling in the aid of a disciple of Hahne-
mann, and was very careful to lay all the blame upon Dr.
Mahony : for, said she, I know nothing about it. My
patient was in a darkened room, and hence I could not well
see what manner of woman she was ; but I soon learned
she was the widow of an Indian officer, had spent m^y
years inJEndia, where ^e hadjiad ophthalmia a great
in^ y times, ahd phat she was in the habit of getfeg opE-
^Snu^ohce or twice aTye^ or even ofteneir, ever smce.
ft general^'TastVci' several and then gdt’ tetter ;

no kind of treatment seemed to be of any avail. Did I
thin k homoeopathy would do her any good ? I replied
that we would try it.

I made an attempt at examining the eye, by hfting up
one of the laths of the Venetian blind to let in the light,
and then everting the lid ; but Hie photophobia and con-
sequentXblepharospasm.^ere so great that I barely suc-
ceeded in recognizing that the right eye was a red, swelled
mass, while the left one was only comparatively slightly
affected ; in fact, a case of ophthalmitis. A more minute
examination was impossible, as ■^e pain was so great that
^e patient screamed whenever any light was let into the
^e. I took a mental note of the chief symptoms, notably
of the fact that the inflammation was chiefly confined to
thft_ right eye, and went home and worked out the homoeo-
pathic equation ; I was specially anxious to make a hit,
and so I spent about half an hour at the differential drug-
diagnosis. The drug I decided upon w&s '' Phosphorus.
Thus —

'SiTc.Phos.xm.^i. Sac. lac. q.s. Div. inp. seq. xij.

S. — One in a little water every hour.

That would he about the one-hundredth part of a grain
of Phosphorus at a dose, or rather less.

58

I called the next day, about eighteen hours thereafter,
and my patient opened the door herself, slightly screening
her eyes with her hand, and quite able to bear a moderate
amount of light. The inflammation was nearly gone;
the next day it was quite gone.

Patient’s amazement was great indeed ; in all the
twenty years of these ophthalmic attacks she had suffered
much, and had had a number of doctors, including
London oculists, to treat her, but to no purpose. And yet
she had been treated actively, and there had been no lack
of physic and leeches, and also no lack of medical skill ;
but there was lacking in their therapeutics the one thing
needful . . . the law of similars.

How was it that I, with no very special knowledge of the
eye or its diseases, and with only usual practical experi-
ence, could thus beat skilled specialists and men of thrice
my experience ?

Was it, perhaps, greater skill, deeper insight into the
disease, more careful investigation of the case ? By no
means ... It was just the law of similars, patiently
carried out in practice.

My dear allopathic confrere, why are you so very simple
that you leave us homoeopaths with this enormous advan-
tage over the best of you ? Any little homoeopathic David
can overcome the greatest allopathic giant if he will only
keep to his Materia Medina, and the directions of Hahne-
mann. And the good thing lies so near, and is so con-
stantly thrown at you. If we homoeopaths were only to
make a secret of our art, you would petition the Govern-
ment to purchase it of us !

But revenons d nos moutons. My patient was naturally
very grateful, and said, " If that is homoeopathy, I wonder
if it could cure; my cat^act ?” On examining the eyes
now with some cafe one could readily perceive that thwe
w ere; opacities be hmd rile p u p ils.^' t^^ of the right b&g
me much more extenswe. Sfie tiiien mformed me that
me ^H~had ^tmact fe some years, and was waiting for
it to get ripe so as to undergo an operation. She had been
to two London oculists about it, and they agreed both
as to diagnosis and prognosis, and eventual operative
treatment. She had waited a year and gone again to one
of these eye surgeons, and been told that all was satis-
factorily progressing, although but slowly ; it was thought
it might take another two years before an operation could

be performed. Her vision was also getting gradually
worse, and she could not see the parting in her hair at the
looking-glass, or the names over the shops, or on the
omnibuses in the street ; could see better in the dusk than
in broad daylight.

In answer to her question as to the curability of cataract
with medicines, I said I had no personal experience
whatever on the subject beyond one case, and I thought
that from the nature of the complaint, one could hardly
expect medicines to cure it, or even affect it at aU. Still,
some few homoeopaths had published such cases, and
others had asserted that they sometimes did really suc-
ceed in curing cataract with homoeopathic treatment.
I added that, inconceivable as it was to me, yet I had no
right to question the veracity of these gentlemen, simply
because they claimed to do what seemed impossible.

In fine, I agreed, at patient's special request, to try to
cure her cataract with medicines given on homoeopathic
lines !

I must confess that I smiled a little at my own temerity.
But I consoled myself thus : What harm could it do to
treat her while she was waiting to get blind. At the worst
I should not prevent it !

So it was agreed she should report herself every month
or so, and I would each time prescribe for her a course of
treatment.

All this was there and then agreed to.

She took from May 29th to June 19th, xSy Calcar ea
carbonica 30, and Chelidonium i, one pilule in alternation
three times a day. Thus she had two doses of the Calcarea
one day, and one the next, and conversely of the Cheli-
donium,

There were indications for both remedies, though I
cannot defend the alternation: I hope I alternate less
frequently now.

Then followed Asaj[geMa 6 j and D^itqlis J^urp.

Then and subsequeiTtly'^^^W ‘^0, and

then Catcared Chelidonium, ^

Thus I continued ringing the changes on Phosphorus,
Sulphur, Chelidonium, Calcarea carbonica, Asafoetida, and
Digitalis, till the beginning of 1876.

On February 17th, 1876, |^rescrib^ Cdseminum -yo in
pilules, one three times a day. "‘^'lliis’was continued for a
months

6 o

Then I gave the following course of drug treatment :
Silicea 30 for fourteen days ; Bell(^onna 3 for fourteen
days r Suy>hur ^0 three times a day for a week ; anckthen
Phos^^fWx for a fortnight.

A month or so after this date — March 20th, 1876 — one
morning heard some very loud talking in the hall, and my
patient came rushing in and crying in quite an excited
manner that she could almost see as well as ever. She
explained that latterly she seemed able to discern objects
and persons in the street much better than formerly
but she thought it must be fancy, but that morning she
suddenly discovered that she could see the parting in her
hair and she at once started to inform me of the fact and,
en route, she further tested her vision by reading the names
over the shops which she pre\dously could not see at all.

I ordered the same course of treatment again, and in
another two months the lenticular [or capsular) opacities
completely disappeared, and her vision became and
remained excellent.

She had never any recurrence of the ophthalmia, and
she remained about a year and a half in my neighbourhood
in good health. She then went abroad again, and in her
letters to her friends since, she makes no mention of her
eyes or sight, and hence I fairly conclude that she con-
tinues well.

The patient’s age is now about fifty or fifty-one.

I have detailed this case somewhat circumstantially,
so that my conversion to a belief in the medicinal cur-
ability of cataract may appear to others as it does to me.

This case made a considerable stir in a small circle, and
a certain number of cases of cataract have since come under
my care in consequence, and the curative results I have
obtained in their treatment are extremely encouraging.

And I may add that I published this in the year 1880,
and since then I have partially or completely cured
a number of cases of cataract with remedies, and this
power I possess because I am privileged to be a homceo-
path.

XXXIV

You ask me whether the homoeopaths as a body en-
dorse my views as to the amenability of cataract to
medicines? ' ■■

6 r

My answer is that some do and some do not, but that is
not material ; the task is very difficult, and not within the
power of every physician who happens to practise on
homoeopathic lines : the higher and highest work of which
homoeopathy is capable depends upon the capacity of the
operating clinical artist — ^i.e. upon the homoeopathic
practitioner. What I clai m for homoeopathy is what
/ have done with its aid myself ; other physicians wiU be
able to do more, and some less.

As my thirty-fourth reason for being a homoeopath I
will cite the details of a case Of cataract, begun in May,
1884 and ended in May, 1886.

Mrs. V — , act. 66, came under my observation on May
20th, 1884. She came through a friend whose cataract
had been cured by me with medicines.

Mrs. V.’s history is this : In November, 1882 and in
April, 1883, she had been operated upon for cataract of
the right eye. Inflam m ation set in, and the eye was lost.
Now her.left eye.has cataract, the lens having a grey look,
and her vision is much impaired ; she wears spectacles,
but can no longer sew. or thread a needle with their aid.
Her father and his sister had cataract. Patient's ..skin '
is scaly and pimply, more particularly that of the face.

B Tc. Sul^h^'^o. ‘

S. — ^Fiv^arbps'm water night and morning.

Auguk •ycdh . — Since last date I sent her a medicine, but
omitted to note it. She thinks her sight clearer.

Calc. carb. 30.

October zgth . — “ I am thankful to say my sight keeps
better, only I am nervous, and everything falling makes
me jump.”

Thuja 30.

December 2nd. — " I feel my sight improving.”

Cau^icum 100.

January xst, 1885. — ” I am thankful to teU you my
sight is much better ; I can now see wonderfully well to
read and write with my spectacles on, and I can see very
well to go about or do anything in the house without
the spectacles.”

Rep.

March 2^th . — “ Qgmot^ear the light so well ; the eye
wtdch is bUnded w^^ very much.”

■ Psor. 160. ' ■ ' ■ ■

62

April 28th . — Bad cold.

jPuls^.xx.

Way 2nd . — On this day the patient paid me her second
visit, and the note in my case-book runs, “ The left lens
is decidedly less milky ; can see to thread a needle.”

Rep.

July 2nd. — “ My eye is not quite so clear.”

Silicea 30.

August 2yth . — No change.

Causticum C.

October ^rd . — ^Better of self, and sees better.

Rep.

January x8th, 1886. — No further change.

Rep.

March gth . — ^About the same as three months ago.

Puls. XX.

May x8th . — ^Vast improvement ; can read, write, and
see well, and there is now only the faintest opacity of the
lens.

I heard from her in October, 1887 and her vision con-
tinued in the same excellent state, and she is now just on
seventy years of age.

So you see here one eye had been lost through the opera-
tion for cataract, and nevertheless the cataract in the
other eye had been cured. I do not say the lens is at
the centre as clear as yours or mine, but the cataract is
gone, and that little rest of opacity does not affect the
vision at all appreciably, and is not of the nature of pro-
gressive cataract, but is the remaining bit of it that
Nature cannot get rid of, but it is no longer cataract, but
its stationary remains.

Does tMs case convince you ?

XXXV

It is the merest folly on your part to pretend to question
my diagnosis of cataract ; whatever truth there may have
been in such objections when I cured my first case nearly
a dozen years ago, that can hardly be valid now. But
I make you a present of cdd diagnostic power, if that will
please you, inasmuch as the cited cases were diagnosed
by eye sj^cialists of the greatest eminence and experience,
so what is your next objection ? That it was not smile ?

63

then take what I published in the “ Homceopathic
World,” October ist, i88i. I will copy it word for
word : —

Case of -Cataract Much Ameliorated by Medicine

In a little monograph I have sought to defend the thesis
that cataract can be often cured, and still oftener ameli-
orated, by the aid of medicines given internally. The
bulk of the profession, of course, ignore the thing entirely,
that I expected. A few of the more enlightened wel-
comed the little book as an honest attempt — as an imper-
fect, but solid beginning. Yet others shook their heads
in good old-fashioned honest doubt, and muttered some-
thing about " mistaken diagnosis ” ; and this not without
a chuckle at their own superior powers in this regard.

Since the publication of “ Curability of Cataract with
Medicines,” I have continued my humble efforts in the
same line, sneers and jibes notwithstanding. I have only
treated a very few cases, partly because I do not care to
begin unless a patient is willing, if necessary, to go on for
a year or two, and this most of them decline.

It is no wonder people are very incredulous about the
possibility of modifying the stroma of an opaque lens ;
for it is indeed very difficult, and I fail myself but too
often, yet by no means always, and I consider the future
of the question very hopeful.

The opponents of the thesis that an opaque lens can
be modified by medicines often cite the very aged as more
than usually hopeless. But I propose to bring a case show-
ing that even an octogenarian may be materially benefited,
and get a considerable amount of useful vision restored.
It is the oldest case I have ever treated, and has turned
a few scoffers into respectful listeners. I do not give all
the treatment, but only the relevant part of it.

Mrs. — , aet. 8i, came under observation at the end of
the year 1880, suffering from cataract of both eyes,
diagnosed by various ph3^icians and specialists. Her
vision was much impaired ; reading had become impos-
sible, and she could barely recognize a person in the street,
or the pictures on the walls of my consulting-room.
Thinking the case hopeless, principally on account of her
advanced age, I did not enter with my wonted minuteness
into her case, but gave Chdidonium tx, five drops in water
night and mornin<y

64

February 2 nd, i88i. — She came and said she felt more
comfortable in her mouth, her tongue being less hard and
stiff ; vision the same. Thinking there might be yet a
glimmer of hope for the venerable lady — at least that
absolute blindness might possibly be averted — I went into
her case with greater care. I found she had occasional
diplopia, and things seemed farther off than they really
were. But the thing that had long distressed her was
this : On awaking in the morning her tongue was as hard
and stiff as a board. That this should have any connec-
tion with the cataractous lenses was not apparent ; still
it was the most constant, peculiar, and characteristic
symptom, and, moreover, a very distressing one. I
turned up a Repertory, and finally decided on Sulplmr
ipd^un^ (see S3miptom 40 in AUen’s Encyclophd^^.
Considering the general character of the remedy and the
pathology of the disease, I did not hesitate, but gave
six grains of the fourth centeimal trituration every night
at bedtime.

March 21st. — My report for this day in my case-book
reads thus ; — “ Hardness and stiffness of tongue gone,
and she had it two years; it was quite distressing;
s^ decidedly better at a distance.”

*“"SEe came by rail to town to see me, and a married
daughter was in the habit of meeting her at the station.
When she first came to me she was not able to recognize
her daughter on the platform, but this morning she
recognized her already at quite a distance, and that
readily, and can as readily discern my pictures.

Rep.

Jidy . — ^Vision much improved ; can now read an
article in the newspaper.

"S^. I odium 30.:

August. — ^Receive word from the daughter that patient
now sees so well that she does not propose continuing
treatment any longer. She reads books with large print
comfortably.

September x$th. — A. lady friend of the patient called
about her own condition, and remarked, " Mrs. — now ,
reads the paper from an hour and a half to two hours every
day.”

She is now eighty-two y^s of age.

London, September, 1881.

Thi%is my thirty-fifth reason for being a homoenna+h

65

XXXVI

You are in a sense quite right in sa3hng that my last-
cited case was not a complete cure, but kindly note that
I did not say it was ; moreover, the cure was enough, for
what more does an octogenarian want than the power
to read the newspaper by the hour ? As my thirty-
sixth reason for being a homoeopath I will mention one
other case of cataract — ^this time so completely cured that
patient can read No. r. Is that good enough ?

The lady came first to me in June, 1884, being then
fifty-eight years of age, and as clear-thinking, hard-headed
a sceptic as ever you saw. The diagnosis was made by
an eminent specialist, whose opinion you would not dream
of doubting. You see he is so sweetly orthodox ! If
he were to turn homoeopath, however, he would not
(thereafter) know a lens from a broom-handle !

I^looked humbly at the. ler^es — ^bpth pf^ them— and
found them uniformly mUky-opaque ; but asT"am not
an oculist, and, besides', am so sorely heterodox, you will
not care to know how the lady’s lenses appeared to my
optics; so just take it parenthetically as it were, that
to me they were “ kinder darkish hke ” : cataract our
orthodox specialist calls it ! WeU, I discharged her
cured in July, 1887, and able to read No. x. As I said
before, is that good enough ? In any case it is my thirty-
sixth reason for being a homoeopath — so I bid good-bye
to cataracts for the present !

P.S. — In case you shotild care to know what remedies
this lady took, I subjoin a list, viz. Urea 6 and then 12,
Psoricum C, Calc. carh. C, Sulphur p, Silicea 30, Thuja C,
Cede. carb. 30, Causticum C, Silicea C, Caust. 30, Lapis
alb. 30, Sulphur 30, Conium i. Calc, fluor. 30, Graphites 30,
Chelidonium d, Hepar 3, etc., etc. The reasons for giving
them I cannot explain here, but the patient’s lenses are
now so clear that she sees to thread needles.*

XXXVII

You take exception to the number of remedies used in
my last case, and want to know " which cured the case ? ’’

* Note. — T he indications for all these remedies may be fonnd in
any McU&ria Medica Pura

Will you get a long ladder and put it up against the side
of your house, and mount it so as to get into your house
by the top window ; and when you have safely performed
the feat, write and tell me which rung of that ladder
enabled you to do it.

I sympathize with your objection, because it was once
my own great stumbling-block in accepting the results of
homoeopathic treatment ; it may perhaps be adequately
explained somewhere in the vast literature of the homoeo-
pathic fraternity, but I have never come across such
an explanation, and hence have had to work it out for
myself. I will put it to you thus : — In difficult, chronic,
complicated cases of disease you require not a remedy but
a'ladder (series) of remedies, not one of which can of itself
Sect the cure, but each of which works cvLte-wards, thdr
cumulative action eventuating in a cure — ^that is how
t cure cataract, and many other chronic diseases that are
currently held to be incurable by most men of all shades of
therapeutic opinion. I regard this power of utilizing a
long series of remedies for the cure of difficult chronic
cases as only second in importance to the law of cure
itself. I originally learned the thing in conversation with
Dr. Drysdale of Liverpool, though not formulated by him,
and I doubt if Dr. Drysdale ever did formulate it. In
my own mind I call it the ladder of remedies plan. It is
what I often heard Dr. Drysdale call “ a course of
mefficin^”.

I often compare the cure of a difficult case of disease
to a game of chess in which you have king, queen, bishops,
knights, rooks, and pawns, the various powers of which
you must learn before you can play chess.

You do not expect to play chess without learning the
game, but you do expect to be able to treat homoeopathic-
aUy without even knowing the homoeopathic pawn 1
Hence my writing you all these reasons for my being a
homoeopath is a futile farce. I am, in fact, writing to you
about chess without your knowing the pieces or even the
board ! ! Still here is my thirty-seventh reason.

It is more than a dozen years ago that I, in the North,
attended aj;ery wealthy lady, alx)ut seventy years of age,
fqgacute mania, ibe friends had, under the advice of the
joc^ practitioner, decided to send her to an asylum, but
I objected to that course, being very sure she would never
come out again. I have had charge of an asylum ms^elf,

57

and know well that, therapeutically, anyone that goes to an
asylum is lost. They are treated with great kindness, and
kept from harm and mischief, but as to curing them —
well, the “ mad doctors ” never even try ! and, indeed,
it is useless to treat the demented allopathically. But
good genuine homoeopathy would cure half the inmates
of our asylums. You will question my statement, I dare
say, but it is the bare simple truth all the same. It has
been well and learnedly argued in theory and often proved
in practice, as you may find for yourself if you will refer
to our hereto-relative literature.

Homoeopathic (and other !) practitioners are often
hoodwinked by the personal surroundings of a patient,
and to be pitchforked into a nest of unbelievers to cure
a desperate case is verily no pleasant position to be in, as
any physician of the homoeopathic ilk knows but too well.

Now my patient had a lady companion who cast a
withering glance at my humble self, and I knew instantly
that she would baulk me in my efforts to cure, unless I
prevented it. So I informed her that either she or I must
go, or she must solemnly promise to obey all my orders
wth regard to the patient, “ for,” said I, “ you do not
fieiieve in homoeopathy, do you ? ” ” No indeed, I do
not 1 ” And that young lady’s look of scorn and con-
tempt !

Thax^ to Baptisia. and other common homoeopatWc
reine3ieslny patient made a complete recovery, and never
had a relapse.

""*i?his is my thirty-seventh reason for being a homoeopath,
and if ever I lose my reason and become maniacal, great
Father in heaven, send me a homoeopathic brother, who
will treat me as I treated Mrs. B — .

XXXVIII

If you really wish to know the remedies that " did the
trick ” in my last reason, you have only to look into our
literature with a humble receptive mind, and you will soon .
spot them !

I must get on with my task, which is beginning to
pall upon me, and I really cannot spare the time.

Not very long after I said goodbye to my ex-maniacal
patient I was one afternoon sitting in my consulting-room.

68

when who should appear on the scene but the before-
mentioned lady companion of my said ex-maniacal
patient.

“ Doctor,” said she, " as you have cured Mrs. B— , I
have been wondering whether you could also cure my
sister, who is in an asylum suffering from mania; she
is very bad, and the doctors say they have no hope of her,
as she has been violent ior so long.”

I enquired sorhewIiSt into tlie" nature .of the case, and
gave as my opinion that homoeopathy could cure her.

The plan was communicated to the superintendent
of the asylum, who called me some very hard names, the
first of which was that I was a deceiver, and that I knew
perfectly well that she would never get well. We
required the help of three or four people to bring her
m a special cairiage, and her violence was dreadfuTfof
manjMveeks.

FbFmore than twelve years this young lady has been
as sane as you or I, and has during aU that time fulfilled
the ordinary duties of an independent English lady. If
you care to know what medicines did the good, you will
find the whole case reported in the British Journal of
Eomo&ofathy, about a dozen years ago. I remember
figures with difficulty, so I cannot give you the exact date.
The young lady went with her mother to see the said
asylum physician after she was weU, but this cure did not
lead him, so far as I ever heard, either to apologize to me
for his vulgar slanders of me, or to investigate the system
of medicine that helped me to cure where he failed, and
which cure is my thirty-eighth reason for being a homoeo-
path.*

XXXIX

The weather is bad to-day, so I am not busy in my
chambers ; sick people cannot get out in this dreadful
weather, and that gives consulting physicians a little
time to ruminate. However, a gentleman of seventy-
nine, whom I have just converted to homoeopathy, was
here just now, and ids case must afford my thirty-ninth
reason. It has the merit of being short and neetog no
particular introduction. He came to me last August,

* NoU . — ^TWs lady still contmues quite well (1896).

6 g

and what fixed my attention was his striking resemblance
to the late Lord Cairns, who, by the way, was a homoeo-
path, as was also Archbishop Whately, the logic man.
Fancy the great logician a homoeopafli 1
Well, my patient had been to many eminent physicians
in this London of ours for what he called “ windy dys-
pepsia”. He is in great ^d almost constant pain, full
of foul flatus, constant often involuntary,

which is a terrible distre^ to him. ' ' ' ’ ' ' "

He was greatly improved in a few months, and the
remedies which did it were Arsenicum 5, Nux vomica 5,
Sulphur 5, Lycopodium 12, and Colocynthis 3X.

Said the old gentleman, somewhat sententiously,
“ These medicines seem to suit me.”

XL

An officer in the army brought his twelve-year-old
daughter to me on November 13th, 1886, telling me that
she had something growing in her mouth. A similar
growth had come a year ago, when his family surgeon
excised it ; in six months from the time of the operation
it had grown again;, making it difficult for the child to eat
her food, as it caught the tongue and teeth, and then
bled. This time the doctor ligatured it off thoroughly,
leaving a hole, and informed the father that this time he
hoped its roots were got rid of. Now it has grown again
at the side of the said hole. On examining the mouth
I find in its left side, just to the left of the fraenulum
linguae, , a warty fleshy excrescence, of the shape of a
. cock’s comb, about a quarter of an inch broad at its base,
Md nearly a quarter of an inch high. Patient has normal
teeth; the tongue is coated and she is very pale. I
ordered Thuja occidentalis 30 internally, in infrequent
dose, and a mouth wash of Thuja p, two drops in a desert-
spoonful of water night and morning ; to keep it bathmg
the growth as long as possible, and then expectorate.

As this brought the growth down to the size of a pea,
treatment was discontinued, but she then bit it on three
successive occasions, whereupon it again took to growing,
and in January, 1887, when I saw it, it was about as big
as a horse-bean. This time I ordered jSaWjwr/just as I had
previously ordered Thuja. Under the Sabina patient took

70

on a healthy look, but j. sm^ piece of the jrowth stffl
p'ersistea, when I ' brHefed»^( ^^^m sjfs ]iaws6niand/m "Wm
manner as the Thuja 'arijS’Stwiah^A been useH. That
was in March, 1887, and I did not see her again. But
I met her father in October on another matter, when I
enquired about the case, and he replied, " Oh, she is quite
well ; the lump has been gone a long time, but the hole
is stiU there.”

So if you ever get a little cock’s comb growth in your
mouth, take my advice and have it treated homoeopathic-
ally, for it is, as you see, much better than either excision
or ligature, and you will thereafter have no “ hole ” to
mark the locus in quo ; and let the little tip stand as my
fortieth reason for being a homoeopath.

XLI

Deafness is a very troubleso me thing to deal with, but
it is worth wSK' Being a homoeopath, were it only for the
power it gives one over deafness. I never could make out
what you allopathic fellows did for deafness beyond the
everlasting syringing. I have peered about in the aural
departments of big hospitals, and read the books of noted
aurists, beginning with a namesake of my own, but could
never find that they did any real good beyond clearing
away mechanical hindrances. And even in homoeopathy
it seems to me that our specialists rely far too much on
cutting, scraping, and syringing.

I have very often curedjigafness vdth the aid of homoep-
hht jnoist of the cases Have needed so many remedies
T co^d not che them without occup3dng too much
s^ce!

STlady of sixty, of the VidUe noblesse ccAholiqueanglaise,
came to me in December, 1886, sent by her daughter,
whom I had cured of neuralgia. The daughter had
neuralgia of right side of head very badly, that she
thought originally came from a coup ie vent. She spent
the winter of 1885-6 in Nice, and one day sat next to a
gentleman at the table d’hote ; they compared notes about
their state of bemg, when it transpired that the gentleman
had previously suffered from the very same sort of
neuralgia, and in the identical spot, and that for many
years until he came to me, when I (thanks to homoeopathy)

cured him. I had intended giving the case of deafness
as my forty-first reason for being a homoeopath, but I will
alter my plan, and instead give this cure of neuralgia.

The lady was forty years of age, and came to me in
April, 1886 ; tte pam was in t^nght side of broy^ face,
ear, and neck, arid had Been on ever since the preceding

Nbvemher. '' ’

"T'TWi^a'occidentalis in a rather high dilution and in-
frequent doses cured the neuralgia in a few weeks, and the
lady in question has thought this brilliant cure of her
neuralgia of itself sufficient for becoming a homoeopath,
and if it be enough in itself to convert the sufferer to
homoeopathy, it will surely be good enough to be one of
my fifty reasons, and that the forty-first.

XLII

Having begun in my last communication to give you a
■ case of deafness as my forty-first reason, I fell back on a
case of neuralgia that had been suggested by it, and so
that leave^he„deaf lady Jo do duty now. Well, she came
in December ■'iSBb, because I had cured said neuralgia.

“ You cured my daughter’s neuralgia, so perhaps you
can cure my deafness."

It was a case of long standing that had been under the
best aurists, and they had syringed it and done their poor
Mttle best, giving temporary ease, but not touching the
essence of the_ complaint, which was due to chronic in-
flammation Sd swelling of the walls of the external
m^tus on both sides. "

111 five months the lady was quite cured, and the
remedies were Thuja, Psoricum, Sabina, and Ceanothus,
and one other.

This lady has also become a homoeopath, and now em-
ploys for her family the homoeopathic practitioner living
near her house, and her cure must stand as my forty-second
reason for being a homoeopath.

XLIII

I gave you the cure of a dermatitic state as my last reason
for being a homoeopath ; nosologically we called it deaf-
ness. Let me advance a little on the merely inflammatory

72

state, and give as my forty-third reason for being a homoeo-
path the cure of a small growth. I will call it —

^•Enchondroma Indicis Inured by Calcar sa fluorica Alone

A maiden lady of sixty came to consult me on October
13th, 1883, telling me she had ^shiny swelling on her left
index finger,, which had been there for about ei^teen
months. The lump was h'^d aM painful, and of about
fhe'size of a small split walnut, "hilt rather hatter. ‘ Patient
was very nervous and depr^sed.

B Trit. 3x Cakarea fluorica. Six grains four times a
day, dry on the tongue.

October ■zflh . — ^Very great improvement.

B Rep.

November ^rd . — ^The cartilaginous nature is now clearly
to be felt.

B Rep.

loth . — ^The swelling continues to get softer.

B Rep. (dry on the tongue).

vflh . — ^StiU progressing ; softer and smaller ; on its
middle-finger side it has taken on inflammatory action^ as

it were going to gather, being hot, red, and more swelled.

B Rep.

24th . — ^The tumour is softer and smaller, and patient
is begiamng to bend her finger, which had previously
become quite impossible.

B Rep.

December ist . — Still improving.

B Rep.

15th . — ^Finger is much more normal in colour, and still
progressing. Patient went on with the same remedy until
a short way into the new year. I saw her the last time
on December 29th, when she was nearly well.

If I remember rightly Grauvogl was the first to use and
to recommend the fluoride of lime for enchondroma.

The interest of this case lies not so much in the impor-
tance of the tumour (it was only the size of half a walnut,
or thereabouts), but rather in the fact that onJjr one
rem edy was used, and no other, and no change was in^e
eiffi&JE ^f^'^p^ce of_abode. The !ady EaH^a^fiafid
lump’bn her Bhger for eighteen rnonths ; she took a course
of Calc, fl., to the choice of which homoeopathy led me,
and the lump went away, — Q.B,D.

73

XLIV

I have before pointed out to you that I love the grand
independence conferred upon me by homoeopathy :
when I have a difficult case I do not want to sUde softly
away ’from' responsibilify by file support of a ’consultative
old fogy, whose brams have long’ smce gone to sleep and
^ose msoM is'^bhly medfcd^sbcial. ’ I want to cure
my patient, and were it only for the mental satisfaction.
Now, guided by homoeopathy, and a wee bit of reasoning
power, I can generally do this.

Read the following case of —

Traumatic Swelling;: of Right Breast Cured by
.Beilis Alone

I adduce the following case of a swelling in a yoimg
lady’s breast, rather to exemplify in a neat way the
curative range of the Daisy in the treatment of tumours.

No experienced practitioner will deny the import^t
part played, by bruises, blows, and falls, m the genesis
of tumours and cancer ; and hence our anti-traumatics
ought to figure much more largely in our therapeutics
of (growths from blows.i^ Before giving my case I wiU
quote a very instructive note on this very question that
appeared as leader in the first volume of the Homceo-
pcUhic Recorder (Philadelphia), No. 4, July, 1886.

It runs thus : —

; Malignant Growths

In the preceding number of The Recorder there appeared
three items concerning malignant growths, which deserve
more than passing notice. One is the history of the
development of a malignant formation as the result of the
frequent mechanical irritation of a simple mole on the
face, another recounted the cure of an extensive sar-
comatous growth by an intercurrent attack of erysipelas,
and the third contained the analysis of a series of cases
of carcinoma in all of which there was antecedent injury
by mechanical or chemical means ; in the latter selection
the writer asks in aU seriousness : Is cancer, whatever
its form, ever primary — ^i.e. does it ever originate without
previous injury ?

74

A negative reply to this inquiry is of the highest impor-
tance to those who believe in the curative effects of drugs.
It deprives the disease-action of part of the mysterious,
fateful quality so constantly associated in our minds with
these affections, and which terrorizes to some degree the
powers of the medical attendant. For we hold that the
great majority of physicians, on discovering the existence
of a suspicious growth, are strongly impelled to advise
the use of the knife as the only sure treatment, not-
withstanding that in cases of undoubted malignancy
the value of surgical interference is greatly lessened by
Irrelatively poor results as me^^ by the added years
^vM to' the paHeht.' “ ' ' '

""Moreover, if ^tKe occurrence of an infectious inflam-
mation of the skin has destroyed malignant disease-
process in that issue, there is a fairly good basis for the
view, reasoning by analogy, that a drug-disease — ^i.e, a.
disease produced by the action of a medicine — can, if
affecting a part involved in the malignant process, cause
similarly efficacious results.

In an admirable Report* on the Progress of Pathology,
by J. H. Muser, M.D., Mr. Sutton, F.R.C.S., is given as
authority for the following view : “ Irritation, local or
q^erwise, affecting the tissue, may” cause abnormiJ
l^jEE^argrowtiLs, which, n^g above' the gen^^^^
m^ pfoduw' ’^Oh the oth«r Kaiid, the^epifiS^al
jpow&'may '3^'^into the sub-epithelial tissues, and, on
account of lack of formative development, either from
decline of vigour or general constitutional debility, the
new tissue never develops functionally, runs riot, and
originates tissues of low vitality — carcinomata. The

conditions favourable to the development of carcinomata^''
debuity, etc. — are absent in the young; hence in the
ybiihg we have warts iii the old, cancers.””

""What” theri, is the bearing of these facts upon the treat-
ment of probably malignant tumours ? Passing by the
cures of warts by internal medicine alone, whicffi almost
every homoeopathic practitioner has observed oyer and
over again, we need only call attention to the cures, by the
same method, of; tum ours of the female breast^, an organ
nqtqriqudy dispqse3’to 'maSgnjmt neoplasms ; here the
action of denied, arid what is true of

remedy may be true of many others.

" Piiito. Med!' TSm^" ivi!,' '484.

75

A thorough study of the symptoms of each individual
case, with the view of finding the exact simillimum, the
exhibition of the latter in different attenuations, if neces-
sary, changing the remedy only when a change of symp-
toms demands it, and extreme watchfulness for involve-
ment of ;ae ne^hbourm£ glandular kruH^ make up,

i|^|)pew|'fo3s, the duty of the physician. Whether he
be justified in holding out any hope of cure by
internal medication after evidences of systemic infection
exist, must be decided by his own experience ; but, as
there are always cases in which operation is inadmissible,
or in which it will not be allowed, opportunities will not be
wanting to continue treatment with the properly chosen
remedy.

If statistics of our treatment can be collated and
analysed, the results will, we feel sure, give encourage-
ment to physicians and sufferers as welt, andT'demohstraf e
^ew, and in a strikingly brilliant manner, the value of
our law of cure.

We earnestly hope, then, that those of us who hold
hospital or dispensary appointments will endeavour to
employ the method of internal medication in cases of
malignant growths whenever it is fairly admissible to do
so, and that records of cases containing diagnoses checked
off as to their accuracy by every method known to medical
science, together with the sjunptoms in full and the treat-
ment used, may soon appear in our journals. Thus will
be laid the foundation for a new and lasting monument
to homoeopathy.

Without going so far as the author of this article, I
must certainly say I attribute some of my success in the
treatment of cancers and other tumours,by medicines to
a due recognition of the traumatic fact, not in diagnostics
merely, but also iii therapeutics.

Miss L. C., aged thirteen years, came under my obser-
vation at the end of July, 1879. About eight weeks
previously a miserable lad in the street^hit her on the/
vi^t br e|st/ trith considerable violence ; from that time
'^,ffiS“Seast became swollen and very painful, until
at length she was quite unable to lie on her right side.
Patient’s mother was poiirinaire, as was also her brother,
and my experience teaches me that the members of
poitnmire families are particularly liable to suffer from
blows.

yb

At first no notice was taken of the young lady’s com-
plaints, but week after week went by, and she persisted
in referring to the pain in her breast. Whether any
domestic means had been employed I do not now remem-
ber, but eventually I was sent for, as vague notions of
tumour and cancer rendered the parents uneasy. On
comparing the breasts, the_ right one wM^found to ^
Bj" much' tfie larger very tender."

“ T thought this a very proper case for testing the anti-
traumatic virtue of the old English bruisewort, and hence
prescribed thus : —

B Jc. Bdlisp&rennis zx. 3ij-

S. — ^Three drops' to be taken in water four times a day.
The r^ult was a very rapid disappearance of pain aiid
ahdlff'Oprtnighf patient could lie again bh the
nght side. And a few days later an examination showed
{hat BEie swelling had entirely disappeared.

Nothing whatever was applied to the part, no change
was made in diet, mode of life, or place of abode, and as
the thing had already existed for eight weeks, the posi-
tively curative effect of the Beilis can hardly be denied,
which is the one point this case is meant to exemplify
and to teach, and that because it is so very difiicult to
demonstrate positively the effect of any one remedy when
the tumefaction has become a genuine neoplasia, or
hyperplasia.* Too many of my cases prove this.

XLV

Just one other case of a new-growth as my forty-fifth
reason for being a homoeopath. You will see that the
^£eneral charact&r oi a drug often, helps us where our law
becomes more or less insaisissable. It is a —

Tumour, 4N the\Throat , ■

A married lady of fifty-four came on August 8th, 1883
to consult me about a lump in her throat. In the left
side of Ae top of the neck there wa 9 |a hard bo dy^ bout
size of ^en 's ^g^ut 'flatte]C- The"tumour Bad been
there for a very long tune^'and mth it she had had much
throat irr|tption. It wgs ribiated to the left and behind
the larynx, but whether actually connoted wilk the

* In tWs case there was, of coarse, no hyperplasia*

77

oesophagus or lar5mx, I could never quite satisfy myself,
yt moved up and dowT^th t^^ act of deglutition.

“R'Tnt 3x' gr- vj. ter die.

August 22nd. — ^No change.

B Psor. 30.

October 3th. — ^The throat— i.e. the fullness, uneasiness,
pain and distress in the throat — ^is very much better;
and the tumour has sensibly diminished in size.

B> Thuja occid. 30.

November iki. — ^'The tumour is about half gone.

B Psor. 30.

2<^th . — ^The tumour about two-thirds gone; general
health good.

B Thuja ^0.

December '21st. — ^There is some tickling in the throat.
The tumour is larger again, and the patient feels choky. .

R Psor. 30.

January i^ih, 1884. — ^The tumour has again sensibly
diminished in size.

R PsoK C.

February Sth. — Tumour stiU swollen.

R Mer^. viy.j).

March 3rd'.— ‘ I feel the lump very much less, about',
half its original size,” said the lady. She has much
rheumatism in ankles and knees.

R Silicea, 6 trit., in frequently repeated doses.

3xst. — Has been visiting a friend suffering from con-
sumption, and since then has spit a little blood-streaked
phlegm ; has a good deal of tickling in the throat.
'■RPson30.

April i6th. — ^No coloured expectoration for a week, and
then very trifling ; the tickling in the throat is better,
but the throat feels very rough. The tumour is rather
smaller.

R Sul. iod. 3X, six grains three times a day.

3Qih . — ^No coloured expectoration for the past week ;
the tickling in the throat is very much better, but talking
brings it on. The tumour has lately not altered sensibly
in size, but it is more self-contained, and one can now
demonstrate that it is not connected with the lar3mx, being
in the areolar tissue, behind and to its left. Has a good
deal of rheumatism.

' R Tb.^ Cmduraiigy ^ 3 iv. Five drops in water three
times a day. "

78

May 2xst. — ^Thinks it is not so well ; tickling sensation
in the throat is worse. Feels the spring. The throat is
worse in the morning and when tired.

R Thuja •^o.

June xoth. — ^Throat rather better ; has only had the
coloured expectoration once, but the voice is hoarse, and
she feels her throat weak. Has rheumatism in ankles and
knees, worse after motion. The tumour is a trifle smaller.

R Urea 6.

June xxth. — More blood-coloured expectoration. Has
had aU the symptoms of a cold ; aching all over with
tingling, and feehng giddy and fll ; aphonia ; much ten-
derness in the neck ; rheumatism better ; urine thick
(unusual) ; violent tickUng in the throat with scraping
and dryness ; ihe tumour is nearly gone.

"Die throat symptoms are worse night and morning,
and when she is tired.

' R Tc. Phytolacca decandra x, 3 iv., gtt. v., n. m.

August 6 th. — Better in every way ; the tumour is
barely to be found.

R Rep.

September yrd. — Feels practically well. I can find the
small remains of the tumour only with great difficulty.

R Rep. (at night only).

November X'yth. — Still a little uneasiness in the throat.

R Trit. 3x Sul. iod.

iZtli . — ^Nearly well.

R Rep.

December yist. — ^The tumoiu can not be found, but she
still complains of a husky voice.

R Trit. 4 KaU brom.

I did not siee the patient again for some months, as the
tumour had quite disappeared, and she herself felt quite
well, but she came to me again on

April xoth, 1885, complaining of tickling and irritation
at the old spot.

R Psor. C.

May xxth. — She feels easier in the throat, but the
tumo ur is returning.

**R Trit. yc Sui. iod.

November z^h. — ^The lump is still increasing.

R Pscrr. C.

This lady came again on February 15th, i88fi, and for
the last time on April 30th, 1886, when I discharged her

79

cured. I see her son occasionally on his own account,
and thus know that she continues quite well, and has a
very healthy general appearance.*

I am beginning to breathe more freely now, having only
five more Reasons to bring forward. Confess candidly, do
you not wish homoeopathy were socially ires comme il faut,
and to be had for the asking ? A lady of high rank said
to me three years ago, " If you were not a homoeopath,
Dr. Burnett, I could make your fortune.” Said I, " Well,
my lady, I am very sorry not to enlist you in the laudable
undertaking of making my fortune, which would be at
least very nice for those dependent upon me ; but I am
a homoeopath, and fortune or no fortune, I thank God for
this much of His truth.”

It is late and I am tired, but I trust you will be able to
read my cacography.

XLVI

I have given you a good many details in my last three
or four reasons to let you see the light in which I write
so far as that is possible to you in your ignorance of the
scientific treatment of disease in the sense in which I
understand it. You will pardon the lately given jour-
nalistic quotation as bearing on the subject-idea ; it is
the only one I have inflicted upon you in this lengthy
correspondence, and I wiU not trouble you with another.

Now, I have a partiality for cases with a good sound
pathology that can be seen, felt, cut out, put into the
scales and weighed ! They seem so much more proof-
affording than mere symptoms m given parts, as head-
ache or neuralgia, as these often depart of themselves.
But, generally speaking, you may bet on the permanency
of a good solid tumour. As my forty-sixth reason,
therefore, I must give you the notes, as short as may be,
of a rather rare affection, viz. : —

v^UMOUR Gt Right Beeas^in a Man^

Although tumours of the breast are much more common
in "women tlism in "men, stm they do also occur in the

1896 — return of the tumour, and patient continues quite well
of herself.

t So rare are such cases that I have never seen but three such.

8o

breasts of males, more particularly in later life. Such a
one is the following

On April 23rd, 1881, there came to me a rather tall,
spare, cachectic-looking gentleman, a London professional
man, of about seventy years of age, telling me that ever
since the previous February he had been greatly worried,
and this was followed by a sensitiveness in his left nipple,
which soon passed off and went to the right nipple, wherein
it still was. On examining the part I found it the seat of a
\haxd, tumid massif the size of a pigeon’s egg. Patient first
lidticed it was swelled a month previously. It is not actually
painful, but there is a sensation of fullness and uneasiness^
and he cannot lie on it, hence it arrests his attention.

J8i Psor. 30, m. vi. ; s. 1. q.s., ft. pulv., tales xij., j nocte.

May ']th. — ^There is still a sensation of fullness in it ;
patient thinks it is softer, in which opinion I share, ^t
"is a little smaller. Since taking the powders he hailKd
some bilious attacks.

R Rep.

May zxst. — It is much smaller ; there is much less
sensitiveness, and patient can now sleep lying on his
right side, which was previously not possible.

B Rep.

May 28th. — ^The sensitiveness is now confined to the
nipple alone, still he can sleep l3dng on it. He is con-
stipated, and his tongue is thickly furred.

'Si Hydrastis canadensis 3z, Siv.

S. — Gtt. V., nocte maneque.

June x^h. — ^The sensitiveness still continues, but it has
very much decreased.

Rep.

July 2nd. — ^Less sensitiveness ; tumour stiU decreasing
in size ; 911 the sternum, on a level with the nipple, there
is a scabby eruption of the size of a threepenny piece,
hatdnjg a red ground, the rest being yellowish. He is still
constipated.

B^. Hydrastis canad. 6, 3 iv., gtt. v., n. m.

Ji^^3rd.-^So'£S^^hs* on the scalp ; a yeUow scab
at the middle of the sternum ; also on his hands. The
nipple is no longer sensitive at all.

B Tc^Thuja gccid. 30,^ infrequent doses.

^ I often notice scabby eruptions occur under the influence of our
given in cases of tumours, when said tumours are diminishing
in size. , ....

8i

August z^th . — ^The tumour has disappeared, with the
exception of one of the size of a hazel nut. There is still
some scaly eruption on the sternum.

Psor. 30 (two to a month).

September 16th . — ^No trace of the tumour to be found.
There is still a patch of reddish scaly eruption on the
skin of the chest.

B Tc. Chelidon. maj. 3.3?, gtt. iij., nocte.

October i'^th . — No trace of tumour; stiU a circular
patch at mid-sternum. Bowels a little relaxed.

B Trit. 6. Nat.sul.

October Weil; and has a healthy complexion,

whereas it was, at the beginning of the treatment, quite
earthy.

Six years have elapsed since then, during all which
time the patient has remained well of the tumour — ^i.e. it
has never returned. Two or three times or more in every
year the gentleman is in the habit of coming to see me,
“ To be kept in repair.” Before I began the treatment
I was importuned by his friends as to whether I was quite
sure it was safe to forgo an operation, “which you know.
Sir J. — says is the only chance 1 ”

\^at did the friends say after the tumour was cured by
remedies ? Were they grateful ? Perhaps ; they have
so scrupulously avoided the subject ever since that I have
no means of knowing.

Nevertheless the tumour remains cured, and that is the
main point.

If you care to know my opinion of the pathology of this
tumour, I wish to say I think it was scirrhus. That it was
a very hard lump is quite sure.

Speaking biopathologically, more meo, the basis of the
thing was PsoRO vaccinosis.

Only four more Reasons are now due to you ; are you
prepared to “ come down the tree yet ” ?

XLVII

One can hardly have to deal with a more formidable
affection than Angina pectoris, and in its treatment
homoeopathy can do great things. It is, however, a
mighty mistake to treat the cases all alike, as <|uite a num-
ber of different diseases give rise to the usual angmal

symptoms ; the cases must be diagnosticaUy and thera-
peutically differentiated if they are to be really cwreS.

A short time since it 'was my duty to see a lady in
Belgravia with Angina pectoris; unwonted domestic
drudgery, loss of loved ones, fright, loss of fortune, had
led up to it.

Apart from the anginal attacks there was a chronic,
constant pain across the praecordia, running away under
the left breast. For years blisters had been applied at
intervals with temporary relief, till they could no longer
be borne. Patient was very depressed, sulky, and
morose; the menses suppressed. Aurum metallicum, 3
trituration j 6 grEUhs every four hours, cured the constant
pain in a week, and the an^nal attacks have thus far
not recurred, and patient smhes now and is bright. The
menses have, however, not appeared, and for this she
remains under treatment.

I do not expect you to realize the difference wrought
by the Gold, inasmuch as in my allopathic days I should
have flatly refused belief in my present statement. Hence
if you now feel the same, I can S5mipathize with you, and
I therefore will not insist further than to place it on record
as my forty-seventh reason for being a homoeopath.

XLVIII

Led by ^e law of likes, I have been able to do ve^
^j^actory work with Gold as a remedy in disease ;
if you care to know, I vmite a book on the subject some
years since, wherein I say : —

The following is a case of dropsy of the lower extremities,
which came under my observation two years ago. I was
fetched, I think it was one Sunday, to see a lady ; it was
feared she was beyond recovery. I found my patient,
a lady of about fifty, m bed ; her lower extrernities were
swollen, jp^ful ; the^^itted on juessimj^'Und were wor^
at night, better i n th e morning. ’ Tlurmdema’ had been
^^rmg'ohlor a week or two, but it had' usuafly
^^jieared bylhe morning,' an 3 thus caus^ But very
mtie amdety, but now it had ^eatly increased even in
bed, and vay naturally was causing great alarm. Dropsy
is ahnost always a ^ave symptom, though not always.
In this case I think it was. There was a history of many

83

illnesses, and altogether this drug-picture presented
itself : —

1. There was dropsy, and patient had—

2. Great depression of spirits, amounting to —

3. Profound melancholia,'

4. Then there was great difficulty of breathing, and

5. Weak pulse and feeble heart.

6. She was psoric, and had a good deal of —

7. Discharge from the nose, that at times contained
some blood.

I gave her the Muriate of ^oli 'in the third decimal
dilution, but I do not remember the exact number of drops
or the repetition of the dose, but the dose was not less
than one drop (it may have been two or three), and as
often as every two or three hours, and given in water.

'fhe case got rapidly well, all the oedema having per-
manently disappeared in less than a week. Eighteen
months after this she informed me she had never since
had any return of the dropsy, though her health was
anything but good. This was only a recent case, and,
though grave, was yet not severe as to the dropsy, but
the despondency was almost a substantive malady.

In this case Gold acted as a veritable pick-me-up, and
I submit that fhe remedy was homoeopathically indicated,
and the cure a homoeopathic one ; about the dose I will
not quibble ; with me the best dose is the one that cures.

This happened just ten years ago, and the lady is still
alive and fairly well — so let it stand as my forty-eighth
reason.

XLIX

In human life we have our favourites ; we have them in
our families, and in therapeutics I have a great fondness
for certain remedies, one of which is Gold,

The allopaths say Gold is no medicine at all, because
it is an insoluble metal ! That's what the best Professors
of Materia Medica taught me ; it is fundamentally false
all the same !

Oh, the siUy, silly things they teach one at the schools !
What a frightful heap of old fossil beliefs !

For Gold is no mere function disturber, but a producer
of organic change, and hence its brilliant effects in organic '

84

mischief. The vascular turgescence of Belladonna and.
that of Aurum are very different affairs.

The following interesting and instructive case once
occurred in my practice, viz. : —

^Rheumatic ENDOCAEpm%aN the; Course of Rheumatic

Fever

I was fetched one day in February by a gentleman in
the city to see his wife, a lady of about fifty-five or sixty,
who was lying very dangerously iU at the end of the third
week of rheumatic fever! This gentleman, who is an old
homoeopath of thirty years’ standing, and whose know-
ledge of drugs and disease is really remarkable for a lay-
man, had treated patient himself, and with no inconsider-
able success considering the severity of the case, but
suddenly patient’s condition became yery alarming on
account of the rheumatism having apparently, s^e^pon
' -flie he^t. I found’tfiis condition : patient was proppM
up ‘in' bed and breathing very hurriedly ; the lips bluish ;
tongue dry and coated ; anxious expression of face ;
puffy under eyes ; moist bubbling small rdles all over
chest, with cough ; pulse rapid, compressible, and inter-
mittent ; action of heart floundering ; loud endocardial
bruits ; slight dropsy of feet ; no appetite at all, could
just sucE’”a'~^ape dir sip tea ; profuse perspirations;
lim bs swelled and painful, the joints almost as firmly
locked as if anchylosed ; cannot move hand or foot for
pain and from this swelled, inflamed state of the joints;
flesh of hands puffy; bones of hand swelled, almost
immovable, and tender.

I ordered Aurum foliaium ioure gold)i 2 nd trituration,'
very frequently. Alone and no auxilianes, •

Why (fid I order Aurum ? Because it affects the he^t
and respiration very much like they were affected in tins
patient, and because it, moreover, produces! profuse/
^erspiraiipi^profound weakness,^l^or^a/ and '^great'
'anxiety. Then the bones were greatly affected.

February z^th . — A little easier. Rep.
z^h . — ^Better in all respects. Rep.

20tk. — Considerable improvement in the action of the
heart ; breathing comfortable ; is out of danger. Rep.
^znd . — Continued improvement. Rep.

85

24^^.— Quite comfortable. Continue with Auvum and
t^e sul. trit., in alternation with it. My reason
for alfernatiiig was thai T thought it imprudent to leave
oH the Gold, and yet Nat. sul. was now indicated.

" March 2nd . — Is up sitting by fire. Appetite good.

6 th. — Heart, joints, bones, and hands free from rheu-
matism ; is sitting by fire quite comfortably ; appetite
good ; tongue moist but slightly furred ; feet swell a little
towards evening.

This case so weU iUustrates &e action of Gold on the or-
ganic tissue of the heart that I will leave it as my forty-
miiffi reason'"

When I saw patient first I gave a bad prognosis, and
had it not been for the Gold I fear it would have been
realized. Auxiliaries did not do it, for I used none ;
faith in the doctor did not cure her, for patient had never
seen me before.

Patient’s recovery was complete.

L

Here I am, my dear allopathic friend, arrived at my
Fiftieth Reason for Being a Homceopath.

I mentioned as my forty-seventh reason a case of
Angina pectoris cured by metallic gold, and awhile ago
I stated to you that I considered the wide applicability,
the immense range, the broad scope of homoeopathy afford
ample reason for adliering to it as a practical system of
curative medicine.

As my last-to-be-given reason, let me write off from my
“ Diseases of the Skin from the Organismic Standpoint "
the following — ^premising, merely, that the remedy used was
Sulphur 30 I —

^GiNA Pectoms /from \ Suppressed Skin Disease

One Sunday morning, some ten years ago, a gentleman
ushered his wife into my consulting-room because she had
been taken with an attack of Angiwpectms in the street,
on her way to church. Thou^ only a little over thirty
years of age, if so much, she had been subject to these
attacks of breast-pang; for several years ; they would
t^e her suddenly in the street nailing her, as it were, to

86

the spot, and hence she no longer went out of doors alone,
lest she should faint away or fall down dead, as was
apprehended.

An examination of the heart revealed no organic lesion,
or even functional derangement, and I could not quite
see why a comparatively young lady should get such
anginal attacks. She had been under able men for her
angina, but it got no better, and no one could apparently
understand it. I prescribed for her, and saw her sub-
sequently at her home, to try and elucidate the matter. I
let her teU me her whole health-history from her earliest
childhood. She said she was getting to the end of her
'teens, and was preparing to come out, but she had some
cracks in the bends of her arms that were very unsightly •
these cracks had troubled her from her earliest childhood.
Erasmus Wilson was consulted ; he gave her an ointment
which very soon cured her skin, and the patient came out
socially, made a hit right off, and got married in due
course. She had always been very grateful to Erasmus
Wilson for curing her arms, for otherwise, “ How could I
have appeared in short sleeves ? ”

Bp t there soon followed, dyspepsia, flatulence, dyspnaa,
and .pa lpitation, and fmally^he before-described attacks
of angi na tectoris threatened to wreck her fife. Moreover,
^e.„had borne one dead chM. As I have already said,
there was* ho discoverable cardiac lesion, and from the
lady’s health-history I gathered that this cure of her skin
(though to me the one important point) was to her of no
causal importance.

I gave my opinion that her skin disease had never been
really cured, only driven in by Wilson’s ointment, and that
her ^gina was in reality its internal expression or nietas-
Is^is.' No one believed it, however. I began to treaFHer
ani^sorically, and very soon — I think it was less than a
month from the Simday morning visit — the old cracks
reappeared in the bends of the elbows, and jrom that time
cm she had no further attacks of angina at all, and thenc^
forth she bore living children.'

I am not ignorant of the range of the art-cure of disease in
the wide literature of the world, and I affirm that outside
of homoeopathy smh grand therapeutic work has literally
and absolutely no existence.

Should it be the will of the Most High that I live on in
my present vigour, I shall have yet a great deal more to

87

say to the world in regard to homoeopathy and other
views of curative medicine ; if not, then let these Fifty
Reasons be my legacy to my country and to my fellow-
man the world over. I say this because I intend to publish
them, omitting, of course, all recognizable reference to
your individuality. And of you personally I have very
small hope, for well do I know that though one rose from
the dead yet would you allopaths not believe in any, and
therefore not in my " Fifty Reasons for being a Homoeo-
path.”

Adieu sans revoir

INDEX

Pleurisy

PAGE

15

Febricula

. . 16

Pleurisy

18

Pleuritis Rheumatica

. . 20

Gout

21

Lethargic Somnolency

. . 22

Cancer . . .

23

Fatty Degeneration ....

23

Pain in Left Hypochondrium .

26

Pain in Right Lung

27

Chronic Hiccough ....

. 27, 28, 30

Aphonia

32

Erysipelas

33

Quinsy

34

Ague

34

Neuralgia

36

Shivering Fits ....

37

Headache

. 38

Menorrhagia

39

Exostosis

41

Cranial Exostosis ....

42

Cough — Chronic ....

• 43 . 44. 45

Aneurysm

. . 46

Bright's Disease ....

49

Post-orbital Neuralgia

49

Chronic Headache ....

51

Enlarged Glands — ^Apex-Catarrh

53

Acne of Face and Nose, and Nasal Dermatitis . 54

Neuralgia of Right Eye .

55

Diseased Finger-nails

56

Cataract

56, 60, 63, 65

Acute Mania

66, 68

'' Windy Dyspepsia "...

. . 69

Warty Excrescence in the Mouth

69

Neuralgia

70

Deafness

71

Enchondroma Indicis

72

Traumatic Swelling of Right Breast .

73

Malignant Growths ....

73

Tumour of Right Breast

75

Tumour in the Throat

76

Tumour of Right Breast in a Man ,

79

Angina Pectoris

81

Dropsy of the Lower Extremities

82

Rheumatic Endocarditis .

. 84

Angina Pectoris ....

. . 85

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88

EnlufjJ'ed Tonsifs

even in regard to the tonsils some
authorities in the old school are
waking up to the fact that they
may har’e been put where they are
for some useful purpose, and not
solely for the sui'geon’s benefit. I
quote the follorviug from the Ho-
meopathic r/hr/r/of x^pril, 1S93: —

The Tonsil.s.

In the Rrvuc Hoouvopatliique
Beige of December, 1S92, Dr.
Martiny adduces weighty I'easons
against excising or even cauterising
the tonsils. He quotes from a work
[Etudes Gcvlrales et Pratiques siir
la Phtliisie) by Dr. Pidoux, which
was accorded b}' the Faculty of
Medicine the prize of 10,000 fr.

NATRUM A:
MURIATICUM

(CURES WITH COMMON TABLE SALT)

AS A TEST OF THE DOCTRINE OF
DRUG DYNAMIZATION

BY

DR J. COMPTON BURNETT

THE HOMCEOPATHIC PUBLISHING CO.
12 WARWICK LANE, LONDON, E.C.4

Ke -issued in 1935

NATRUM MURIATICUM

AS TEST OF THE DOCTRINE OF
DRUG DYNAMIZATION

The theory of the dynamization of drugs was, perhaps,
an arcanum of the jatrochemists in the Middle Ages, and
was promulgated by Hahnemann as a doctrine, while
this century was still young, and it may be regarded as
the natural outcome of his law of cure ; he says : —

'' The homoeopathic healing art develops for its pur-
poses the dynamic virtues of medicinal substances, and,
to a degree previously unheard of, by means of a peculiar
and hitherto untried process (i.e. by triturating and
shaking). By this process it is that they become pene-
trating, operative and remedial, even those that, in a
natural or crude state, did not exercise the least medicinal
power upon the human system.'' — Organon, §269.

Then again, §275 — “ The appropriateness of a remedy
for a given case of disease depends not alone on its being
homoeopathically just the right one, but it also depends
as much on the right strength or sufficient smallness of
the dose. If you give too large a dose of a remedy,
even though it be fully homoeopathic to the morbid state
present, and be it never so harmless in itself, it will be
sure to do harm simply by its quantity, and by the un-
necessary overstrong impression which it will make by
acting exactly on the parts of the organism rendered
tender and weak by the natural disease, and this it will
do by the very reason of its like homoeopathic action." —
(§273 of 4th German edition.)

According to Hahnemann then, the strength (size) of
the dose is very important, and the more homoeopathic
our remedy in a given case * the greater the danger of
doing harm.

Many Idllowers of Hahnemann accept his law only
and cast aside the theory of increasing the remedial power

4

of a drug by trituration or succussion as irrational and
unscientific, and these are by no means the least accom-
phshed or least scientific of them, and also by no means
the least popular. Perhaps we may go so far as to say
that the more a man is prone to scientific research, the
less easily can he conceive it possible to exalt the remedial
energy of a drug by diminishing its quantity even though
the diminished quantity be spread out over an indifferent
medium ; and the more popular he is, the less likely
is he to tread the tortuous path. Thus Dr. Kidd tells
us {Laws of Therapeutics, pp. 34, 35. London, 1878) :
'' Twenty-seven years ago I saw the essential truth of
Hahnemann's law was totally independent of his specula-
tions about dynamization. Adopting with great delight
the law of similia similibus curentur as the chief, though
not the only, foundation for therapeutics, I learnt for
myself that Hahnemann's sober teaching, the use of the
pure undiluted tinctures, was a far better guide to heal
the sick than Hahnemann ' drunk ' with mysticism,
calling for the exclusive use of infinitesimal doses. The
latter I cast aside in toto as untrustworthy and unjust
to the sick, whose diseases too often remained stationary
under treatment by globules, but were most effectually and
quickly cured by tangible doses of the same medicines
which failed to cure when given in infinitesimal doses."

Dr, Kidd’s position entitles his opinion to great respect,
but until he publishes satisfactory accounts of those
sick “ whose diseases too often remain stationary
under treatment by globules ” [was the right medicine
in those globules ?] we take it only as his own subjective
opinion, fully concurring in his own quotation from Plato
that ‘‘ nothing can be more repugnant to an ordinary
mind than the thorough sifting of deep-seated, long-
familiarized notions."

Dr. Kidd also states (op. cit., pp. 33, 34) : '' Truth
is greater than Hahnemann, and of late years his specula-
tions about ' Psora ' and ' infinitesimal doses ' have
been tacitly given up by all the most skilful and intelligent
of his followers." The italics are mine.

This sentence contains three propositions. First,
that truth is greater than Hahnemann ; admitted as a
truism. Secondly, that of late years Psora and Dynamiza-
tion have been tacitly given up ; admitted as to some.

but not as to the vast majority/^ But even suppose it
were true of all, would the presence of nothing but
atheists in the world do away with the Supreme Being ?
And thirdly, that these tacit up-givers of “ Psora ’’ and
'' infinitesimal doses ” constitute “ all the most skilful
and intelligent of his followers

Of course we all know that those poor psoric diiutionists
have neither skill nor intelligence ; and besides, — Codlings
the friend, not Short.

The absolute proof that the apsoric crude-druggists
monopolize all the skill and intelligence '' lies in their
tacit mode of doing the doughty deed. They have
invented a new system of philosophy — the tacit method,
and “ cast aside '' exclaiming, ** get thee behind me,
for I am more skilful and intelligent than thou art/'

But casting the doctrine aside without adequate
experimental enquiry does not become science because
it is done by a scientist ; we are all very apt to
leave the rules of scientific investigation at the door
when we involuntarily feel we will not have a thing be
true.

The writer has long been cast about on a sea of doubt
and perplexity with regard to this doctrine of drug
dynamization ; he has frequently listened to the argu-
ments brought forward for and against it, and frequently
himself joined in ridiculing it, constantly feeling himself
unable to believe it possible that the remedial potentiality
of a given drug could be increased by any process of
subdivision whatever, in fact, by any process whatsoever.
The question is constantly presenting itself to one's mind
thus : can the billionth of a grain be potentially more
than a grain ? and the ready answer willingly follows —
impossible. It may be conceded thjat the doctrine of
drug dynamization is a priori, absurd : so is homoeo-
pathy. How can a drug that causes diarrhoea cure
diarrhoea ? Surely it must make it worse. What,
castor oil for an alvine flux ? Clearly it cannot cure it.
Yet experiment shows that what causes diarrhoea does
indeed cure diarrhoea ; like does cure like whether we

* Since writing this I have been honoured with a copy of an Address
delivered before the Annual Assembly of the British Homoeopathic
Society, June 20th, 1878, by R. Douglas Hale, M.D., etc,, Vice-President
of the Society, and on page 6 read, inter alia, ... . ‘'We emphatic-
ally deny that we have ceased to emplov the a —

6

believe it or not ; and hence, what is a priori absurd,
may be a posteriori true. We are all very apt to lose
sight of the fact that our beliefs have nothing to do with
truth. Truth is truth whether it be believed or not.
The born blind may not believe in the existence of the
sunlight because he does not see it. Sound is absurd
to the deaf.

The existence of the word paradox shows that things
apparently absurd and untrue may yet be true in fact.

However, there is this to be well considered. In the
drug treatment of disease we have to deal with conditions
and not with entities, and it is not paradoxical to suppose
that two like and equal forces may neutralize one another.
Two equal showers of rain will make the ground wetter
than one, but a pair of scales weighed down with a one-
grain weight is restored to equilibrium by the addition
of another one-grain weight on the other side ; it is
similar in its action, and like in its power, only it works at
the other end of the beam. Here the state of equipoise
is brought about by similar means that are also equal :
rest results from two motions.

Those ignorant of homoeopathy laugh at it ; the writer
went through this laughing stage of ignorance, but did
not find it very blissful, and so was constrained to put
the doctrine of similars to the test of scientific experi-
ment, and found it a true one of great practical value.
Almost aU homoeopaths have come that way. Hence
disbelieving a thing does not disprove it.

Those ignorant of the doctrine of drug dynamization
in truly scientific practice, laugh at it ; so did the writer,
and that in very good company ; but finding that Hahne-
mann spoke truly in regard to drug action, he thought
that circumstance some slight presumptive evidence in
favour of his other doctrine that remedial power is
developed and increased in a drug by trituration and
succussion.

Therefore he put the theory to the test of careful clinical
experiment with the result that he has passed consider-
ably beyond the laughing stage. The results obtained
from clinical experiments ought to satisfy the most
critical mind, if not blinded with prejudice, for they
constitute the only scientific method of settling the
question at all either one way or the other.

But it is much easier to satisfy one’s mind about the
truth, or otherwise, of homoeopathy than about the truth
or falseness of the theory of potentizing drugs.

Expediency and policy can have no weight with us :
if the Hahnemannian doctrine of drug dynamization be,
as it is averred on competent authority, a great stumbling-
block to the profession, and a hindrance to the spread
of the major doctrine of similars, we can only regret
it, but must proceed, and also insist upon it before
the whole world, in the path of truth seeking coUte qui
coute. What can be more beautiful than truth for its
own sake ?

In casting about for the best method of carrying out
these clinical experiments various plans suggested them-
selves, but no very satisfactory one.

In the first place, we cannot accept most acute diseases
as appropriate for experimentation, because of the many
objections that may reasonably be offered to the results
of any treatment of them. It is said that almost all
acute affections tend to recovery of themselves. If an
experiment result in apparently shortening the course of
any such affection, it is objected that the vis medicatrix
natures did it ; or, the disease being one that runs a
definite course if treated expectantly, the diagnosis is
called in question.

Apropos of the expectant or do-nothing method.
If one of our learned fraternity declare his non-belief in
medicine and give only a placebo without prayer, we
think him very scientific, a great pathologist, and a fine
kenner of the natural course of disease ; he watches
Nature's ways purely and simply, desiring to be neither
her minister nor her master, but only her observer, and
the law protects him and the faculty honour him. But
let one of the unlettered Shaker community do the same
thing with prayer, and the law and the faculty unite to
punish him. So if there be not one law for the poor and
another for the rich, there are one for the doctor and
another for the Shaker — and all the worse for the
Shaker.

But to return, the writer believes that he sometimes
succeeds in breaking up measles with the aid of Gelsem-
imm and Sulphur, but it might be a very difficult
matter to satisfy another that he really does.

8

Hence, acute affections of fixed nosology are mostly
eliminated as offering too many difficulties, in private
practice especially.

Of chronic affections a great number are also not
appropriate ; thus a chronic ulcer of the leg may suddenly
take on a healing action independently of the treatment ;
a chronic bronchitis or other congestion may be suddenly
made better by change of temperature or the veering
round of the wind. Still there remain some chronic
complaints that are eminently fitted for experimentation
move particularly certain symptoms or groups of symptoms.

Of course no alterations are to be made either in diet
or hygiene, or place of abode.

Having determined on the kind of case best adapted
for proving or disproving the doctrine of drug dynamiza-
tion, another serious difficulty presents itself, viz. : —
whether the drug that supposedly proved itself curative
of a given ailment, for instance, in the billionth dilution,
did so simply because it contained some of the right
medicine. Thus if a headache disappear in three days,
under the use of Gelseminum 6, and granted that it
disappeared propter hoc, how are we to know that there
was any dynamic effect there since probably it may have
yielded to five drops of the fresh juice of the plant perhaps
even more promptly ? Therefore it should be shown
that the crude substance in various quantities and in a
soluble condition failed to effect the cure.

'Here, again, another difficulty crops up. You must
give the remedy in substance first, for the dilution might
cure, and whether it did or not the experiment would fail ;
if the dilution cured there would be no opportunity of
trying the crude substance, and if it failed to cure the
experiment would of course fail altogether in the present
sense.

Therefore you give the drug in substance first of all.
Then comes this other question : how long does the
substance given continue to influence the economy or
the disease in it ? Suppose we were to assume a fortnight
as the duration of its action, say of Bryonia 0, might
not the objection be raised that Bryonia 0 continues
to influence the organism for three weeks, and therefore
the cure supposedly effected by Bryonia 6 in the third
week might in reality have been due to the Bryonia 0 ?

9

Again, this would have to be determined for every
single drug, since the duration of their action is held
to be different.

So the thing bristles with almost insuperable difficulties.
Still the matter calls for elucidation and, if possible,
settlement.

For it has been affirmed by many able practitioners,
by Hahnemann himself, and it is being daily and hourly
re-affirmed by men of sound science that drugs do act
differently and better when dynamized. In fact, many
affirm, as did Hahnemann, that the doctrine is of tran-
scendental importance, as many serious diseases can only
be cured with dynamized drugs, being entirely incurable
with the same drug in substantial doses, and so often
altogether incurable unless with a highly potentized
remedy.

Yet we cannot accept any man’s dictum, and faith
can have no place in science. In verba magistri jnrare
does not advance science one whit, but neither does mere
sceptical negation.

Any experiments on the subject, to be satisfactory,
must be of such a nature that they may be repeated
by others, proper circumstances and material being
given.

It seems to the writer that there is one drug above all
others in the materia medica which may greatly help
in the elucidation of this important subject, viz. Natmm
muriaticum. He has not the pretension to settle the
question one way or the other, except for himself, but
he thinks his ideas on the subject, together with a few
clinical experiments, may prove suggestive to his pro-
fessional brethren, and possibly advance the cause of
truth a little.

He will advance it historically, that is as the thing
arose and grew in his own mind stimulated by observation.

Observation I. — Mrs. B., aet, 24, came under treat-
ment in 1876, in the early rnonths of pregnancy, with
very severe neuralgia oi the face. The case proved
itself very obstinate, and many drugs were fruitlessly
tried, but eventually it yielded to China given in the form
of pilules saturated with the matrix tincture, which
drug was chosen because of ferspiration breaking out

10

when the pain became very bad. The neuralgia con-
stantly re-appeared, and finally China ceased to have any
effect. Then Popuhis tremuloides was given simply
because of its being a congener of China and did good,
in fact quite cured for the time.

This pregnancy passed and my patient consulted me
again, being again enceinte early in 1877, for the same
kind of neuralgia, and this time its obstinacy nearly
reduced her and her physician to despair.

The case was treated in the old Hahnemannian fashion
according to the totality of the symptoms which were
very few and apathognomonic, the neuralgia being
always bad, and always worse, and apparently not
ameliorated by anything.

After many weeks of fruitless endeavours to cure this
neuralgia with medicines chosen from the repertory, I
turned to Guernsey's Obstetrics (2nd edition) and found
I had already tried all those given in his list at pp. 372,
373, 374, except two ; these two I then fairly tried and
again failed. So my patient had received Aconite,
Belladonna, Bryonia, Calc, c., Cocculus, Cimicifuga,
Coffea, Gels., Glon., Ignat., Mag. c., Nux. v., Puls., Sepia,
Spig., Sulph., Verat. a., China, Populus, and some others.
Besides which she had applied, often in almost frantic
despair, nearly every known anodyne, so that the soft
parts of the face seemed almost macerated.

Here I suggested change of air (what should we poor
practical physicians do without this ultimum refugium),
but circumstances prevented her from leaving Birkenhead
for more than a day or two, so her husband took her for
little outings to New Brighton and Southport, and Chester,
when it was observed that the neuralgia was worse at the
seaside and better inland.

A happy thought struck me that this might be due to
; the"s^ in the air at the seaside, and, being moreover
absolutely at the end of my tether, I acted on it and gave
Nat. mur. 30, one pilule very frequently : the neuralgia
at once began to get better and in a day or two was quite
well. It subsequently returned at intervals, much less
severely, but promptly 5delded to the same remedy
in the same dose. The 30th dilution was chosen simply
because some pilules of this strength were in patient's
chest.

II

The patient was quite satisfied that the Nat. nwr
efiected the cure, and so was I, and so will many others
be, but in a general way the case will not carry conviction
to unprepared minds and still less so to prejudiced ones.

Hitherto, I had had no great respect for Natrum
niunaticum as a remedy, in fact none whatever, having
but rarely, if ever, prescribed it. Indeed, how can a
sensible man believe that the common condiment salt
which we ingest almost at every meal, can possibly be
of any curative value, especially as some are known to
eat salt in considerable quantities every day and that
without any apparent deleterious effect.

Dr. Hughes in his Pharmaco-dynamics, 2nd edn.
p. 411, says “ I really know nothing myself of the virtues
of Salt.” We find him now, however, a riper homoeo-
pathic scholar, for in the 3rd edition of the same admirable
work, p. 561, he gives an interesting case of defective
nutrition, showing itself especially in emaciation with dry
ani ill-coloured skin, accompanied with depression of
spirits and suspected abdominal disease. Here a few
occasional doses of Nat. mur. 30 changed the whole
condition and initiated a complete recovery.

This testimony is very valuable and especially gratify ing
to me, and, moreover, carries conviction to my mind.
It is evident that Dr. Hughes unwillingly yielded to a
belief in the doctrine of drug dynamization, and would
fain have continued to ” know nothing of the virtues
of salt”.

To believe in salt as a remedy is almost s5monymous
with believing in the doctrine of drug dynamization,
and a belief in this doctrine is extremely repulsive to one’s
common sense. Perhaps the proper spirit would be
gratitude to a beneficent Creator.

Worse at the seaside has since proved itself a valuable
indication for Natrum muriaticum with me.

Obs. II. — A young gentleman of about 21 years of
age came under treatment for Synovitis of right knee with
considerable effusion. Patient had a dirty looking skin,
was constipated and had many Nat. mur. pains in the
lower extremities.

B Natrum muriaticum 6.

Fiat. pul. gr. vj.

12

Dose. — One in water every three hours. Rest in the
recumbent position.

I did not see the patient again, but he was observed
by my colleague, Dr. Reginald Jones, who kindly gave
me the following report : The medicine purged the

patient so severely that it had eventually to be left off ;
it also produced a great discharge of the urates, the urine
becoming very thick therewith.'*

No other medicine was given and patient was quite
well in a fortnight.

Dr. Jones was much interested in the action of the
remedy and declined to accede to the patient's request
to be allowed to discontinue the medicine because of the
purging. Patient's friends at length became alarmed at
the catharsis and his brother called upon me to beg that
the medicine might be discontinued.

This case being acute might have got well of itself in
the manner described, and Nat. muriaticum possibly
had nothing to do with it.

We know that synovial effusions will often spontane-
ously rapidly disappear (Sir Thomas Watson).

""”The” diarrhoea ceased when the medicine was dis-
continued, but this may also have been mere coincidence :
critical diarrhoeas tend to cease of themselves.

This case is not given in the expectation that many
will credit Natrum muriaticum with having anything
to do with the course of the case, but to introduce —

Obs. III. — Mrs. M., aet. 50, or thereabout, had a most
severe attack of Rhe umatic fever, the joints being much
swollen, red and distressingly painful. The usual
homoeopathic treatment was adopted but with no great suc-
cess. It was her fifth attack of rheumatic fever. Between
the third and fourth week Dr. Jones and I saw her together
and found this condition : ill-coloured skin ; obstinate
constipation ; foul tongue ; ^urine very pale and limpid ;
great depression of spirits ; fever ; joints red, swelled
and painful ; great restlessness ; low and desponding
of the future ; sour perspirations ; insomnia ; bedP'sores,
and great weakness.

We agreed in the opinion that the emunctories had
almost left off work and required to be brought back to
their duty. A sharp cathartic combined with a diuretic

13

seemed to be indicated by the general condition, but
contra-indicated by the profound adynamia, and hence
the blessing of a refractissima dosis. My consultant's
observation in Case 11 . caused him to suggest the same
remedy. So we put patient on Nat, mur. 6 trit., as much
as would lie on a shilling every two hours in water.

' No other medicine was given, and no auxiliaries used.

Next day her urine became a little cloudy ; the second
day the bowels were moved and the urine had a red
deposit ; then diarrhoea with loaded urine set in ; the
swelling, redness and pain in the joints went away ;
the skin became cleaner looking ; the tongue cleaned
gradually, the perspirations ceased, her spirits became
brighter, and in ten days from beginning the medicine
she was in full convalescence, though still very weak.

Patient suffers from chronic asthma with slight
emphysema, and is always obliged to sleep in a semi-
■ recumbent position, but for six weeks after this critical
evacuation she was able to lie down in bed like anyone
else without any dyspnoea.

Many months have elapsed and she is now about in
her house and drives out, still asthmatic and has chronic
rheumatic pains here and there. Her tongue was cleaner
for two months than I had known it for the previous
three years.

This patient lives ten miles away and was not seen often,
but the husband brought daily reports, and when doing
so pleaded hard day after day that the Natrum miiriaticum
might be discontinued because of its purging so severely,
he fearing lest it might weaken her too much. On that
account it was then given interruptedly, but with no
other medicine, and the alvine and renal functions
fluctuated accordingly.

Hahnemann says {Chronische Krankheiten, 2nd edition,
vol. iv., p, 348) : Pure salt (just the same as any other

homoeopathic somatic force dynamized) is one of the most
powerful antipsoric remedies/'

And higher up he speaks of it as an heroic and violent
remedy that, when dynamized, must be cautiously
administered to patients.

Then he exclaims : Welche unglaubliche und doch
thatsaechliche Umwandlung ! — eine anscheinend neue
Schoepfung ! "

14

Still it goes against all common sense and all one/s
notions of things, and no man may be blamed for declining
to accept such a preposterous proposition, merely on
trust ; it is scarcely possible to accumulate sufficient
facts to get anyone to listen to it, much less to believe it.

Dr, C. M. retorts : There are more things in heaven
and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in thy philosophy.''

Obs. IV. — At this stage of things I felt curious to know
what the sixth centesimal trituration of Natrum muri-
aticum might do to my humble self pathogenetically, I
being in my usual health. So I took nearly in
about ten days in little pinches dry on the tongue at odd
intervals. It produced — no, that's too bold a statement.
I got gradually during that time a deep crack in the
middle of my lower lip, which swelled and became burning
and very painful ; the Natrum muriaticum may have had
nothing to do with it, but I gave it up and both crack and
swelling went away. I never had the like before, nor since.

The same symptom is noted by Hahnemann, and Dr.
Allen in his Encycloptadia — ^but removed by. the latter
from the regional division of the '' lips ", and placed under
" skin " which is not only confusing, but also a mistake.

Obs. V. — ^Mr. H., set. 45, came under treatment for
great pain, in the stomach which sent him to bed and kept
him therein great agony.

The last’ year or so he has been subject to these attacks
of epigastric pain, and I was sent for to relieve this as on
previous occasions, and the wife specially requested
me to give something not only for this attack but to use
whenever the attacks came on. He had, besides the pain,
vesicles on the lips drying up into scabs. I gave Nat,
mur, 6 trit. gr. vj. every two hours in water ; next day
(observed by Dr. Jones) it was followed with a great
discharge of the urates and a regular attack of gout.
Has since remained free from these attacks of pain, and
this is now many months since.

It is impossible to tell whether the Natrum muriaticum
had anything to do with the metastasis of the gout from
the stomach to the big toe ; moreover it is not now
medico-scientificaUy fashionable to believe in metastasis.

Obs. VI. — ^A girl of 15 suffering from Hemicrania
dextra and cloudy, thick, red, sedimentous urine. I gave

15

her Nat. mur. 6 trit. and received shortly thereafter a
written report urine quite free from sediment or cloud
in a way it has not been for long The megrim was not
affected.

The young lady and her mother attributed the changed
condition of the urine to the pow'ders ; the urine had been
in the abnormal condition for a long time and my ordina-
tion consisted only in prescribing the powders. Weeks
afterwards the urine continued clear.

This case is not adapted to carry conviction to the mind,
as we know that many atmospheric changes and acci-
dental circumstances of all kinds alter the state of the
water at once.

Obs. VIL — b a.by on the bottle some three months
old. I find it has not slept well for some time and is
now very restless and fretful, and vomits water. Give
Nat. mur. 6 trit. It at once began to sleep two or three
hours at a time and the watery vomiting ceased. Two
days afterwards measles broke out.

The mother conceived a very high opinion of the sooth-
ing, soporific effect of the powders.

Obs. VIII. — Mr. P., aet. 26, has had very thick urine
for months, and for two months very grekt pain in small
oTback, worse on bending and very much worse when
(figging in the garden. Gave Nat. mur. 6 trit. The back
pain and turbid urine disappeared in four days and did
not again appear.

This case carries a little weight with it, and looks
something like a medicinal cure.

Obs. IX. — lady, aet. 54, with Stillicidium lachry-
marum and bad chronic yellow excoriating Leucorrhoea,
Nat. mur. 6 trit.

In one week the Leucorrhoea had quite disappeared
but the Stillicidium was worse.

Chronic Leucorrhoeas are not apt to disappear spon-
taneously in one week, though its possibility cannot be
denied.

Obs. X. — Unmarried lady, aet. 24, Polyuria ; , constipa-
tion with much flatus ; amenorrhoea these two months.
First symptoms worse at the seaside. She is rather thin
mth an ill-coloured skin. Nat. mur. 6 trit.

i6

In a few days the menses appeared, and the renal
and alvine functions became normal.

She had passed her second menstrual period.

A causal nexus between the taking of the Natnm
muriaticum, and disappearance of the symptoms is not
easily established here.

Obs. XL — A clergyman’s wife, about 50 years of age
consulted me on February 29th, 1878, complaining of
severe dyspepsia with other symptoms of Natrum muri-
dticum. My visit was a hurried one so I did not enter
very fully into the case. Nat. mur. 6 trit. vj grains in
water, twice a day was the prescription ; it cured in three
days these symptoms: . occurring morning,

noon, and night, for at least ten years which was brought
on by Quinine ; it was not a hiccup that made much
noise but * shook the body to the ground ’ ; it used to
last about ten minutes and was ' very distressing

How do you know that the hiccup was really produced
by quinine ? I enquired. She answered : At three
separate times in my life I have taken quinine, for tic
of the right side of my face, and I got hiccup each time,
the first and second time it gradually went off, but the
third time it did not ; when the late Dr. Hynde pre-
scribed it, I said, do not give me quinine as it always gives
me hiccup, but he would give it me ; I took it and it
gave me hiccup which lasted until I took your powders ;
it is more than ten years ago since I took the quinine.”

The cure of the hiccup has proved permanent.

This patient is a most truthful Christian woman and her
statement is beyond question.

She has been a homoeopath for many years and my
patient off and on for more than three years, during which
time I have had to treat her for chronic sore throat,
vertigo, palpitation, and at one time for great depression
of spirits.

She had also previously mentioned her hiccup inci-
dentally but I had forgotten all about it, and on this
occasion she did not even mention it, so as far as the
hiccup goes the cure was ... a pure fluke ! But
it set me a-thinking about the Hahnemannian doctrine
of drug dynamization for the thousandth time and has
seriously shaken my disbelief in it.

17

Hiccough is a known effect of Chininum sulfuricum :
Allen’s Encyclopcedia, vol. iij., p. 226, symptoms 370 and

379.

We note from this case that : —

1. The effects of quinine, given for tic in medicinal
doses to a lady, may last for more than ten years, that —

2. Natrum munaticum in the sixth trituration antidotes
this effect of quinine while —

3. The same substance in its ordinary form, viz.
common salt, does not antidote it even when taken daily
in various quantities and in various forms for ten years.
Inasmuch, then, as the crude substance fails to do what
the triturated substance promptly effects, it follows,
therefore, that —

4. Trituration does so alter a substance that it thereby
acquires a totally new power, and consequently that —

5. The Hahnemannian doctrine of drug dynamization
is no myth but a fact in nature capable of scientific ex-
perimental proof, and, inasmuch as the crude substance
was taken daily for many years in almost every con-
ceivable dose, in all kinds of solutions of the most varied
strength it results —

6. and lastly. That the Hahnemannian method of
preparing drugs for remedial purposes is not a mere
dilution, or attenuation, but a 'positively power-evolving
or power-producing process, viz. a true potentization or
dynamization.

This case is probably as good a one as we may ever
expect to get, and it might here fitly close the subject as
far as“ its simple demonstration is concerned, but I have
others in my case-book both corroborating it and pre-
senting new features.

Before leaving this Case XL let us reflect for a moment
on the certainly immense number of modifying and per-
turbating influences this lady had been subject to during
those ten years, as well as living at the seaside and
including the daily use of salt and yet her hiccup persisted
until dynamized salt was given.

Before coming to these conclusions I exhausted all my
ingenuity in trying to explain it away, and that backed
by no small amount of scepsis, but I cannot avoid them
do what I will. Moreover I require more scepsis not to
believe it than to believe it.

I am thus in a dilemma :■ either I must believe in the
doctrine of drug dynamization or disbelieve the most
incontrovertible evidence of facts, which is the province
of the demented.

Or canst thou, critical reader, being more ingenious
and more sceptical than I, help me out of the dilemma ?
Fain would I believe thou canst, for this doctrine of
drug dynamization seems to take away firm material
ground from under one*s feet and leaves one standing
in the air. But I must emphatically decline Dr. Kidd's
tacit method as going quite beyond my skill and intellb
gence.

The next observation of which I have notes, is

Obs. XII. — A lad, aet. 12, living at Parkgate. He
suffers for some time from constipation, loss of appetite,
dirty looking complexion, emaciation, frontal headache
going round to the back, sleepiness towards evening and
first thing in the morning, urine thick with nasty smell.

Excepting the nasty smell, which the boy could not
define, I find all these symptoms in the pathogenesis of
Natrum muriaticum in Allen's Encyclopcedia of Pure
Materia Medica and numbered respectively 529, 353, 251,
885, 64, 970, 561.

Therefore Nat. mur. 6, and that six grains in water
forenoon and afternoon. After taking 24 powders he
returned cured of all the symptoms except the odour
of the urine and the emaciation, and feeling very much
better". The prescription was repeated and patient
did not return. His father subsequently informed me
that the cure was complete.

Obs. XIIL — Young lady about 28 years of age : emacia-
tion, chlorosis, for eighteen months slight bearing down
in the hypogastrium, gradually getting worse, and the
last week increasing to very severe cramp beginning in
the back and coming round to the pubic arch, and, when
walking, felt severely in the knees, had frequently to
sit down to get relief from the hypogastric pain, urine
muddy for a long time, obstinate chronic constipation,
j the mouth is dry but therels no thirst,. taste disagreeable.

Nearly all these symptoms are in the pathogenesis
of Natrum muriaticum. Hence Nat. mur. 6, twenty-four

19

six-grain powders taken in a fortnight resulted in the
permanent disappearance of all the symptoms excepting the
emaciation and the chlorotic condition, for which she
was put on Phosphorus.

As to the emaciation she gained six pounds in ten weeks,
but this gain in weight was partly made while under
Ferrum 6, for haemoptysis, chronic cough and large moist
rales in the left lung, and these symptoms having dis-
appeared under Ferrum 6, she went into the country for
three weeks and returned with the above symptoms.

In this case the Natrum muriaticum certainly cured the
constipation and with it the intra-pubic pain. ,,

Obs. XIV. — Gentleman, aet. 34 or thereabouts, has
suffered from a general feeling of chilliness (attributed by
himself to a poor circulation), for more than two years,
sleepiness and droivsiness after dinner for two months,
compelling him to go and lie down ; black spots before
the eyes ; disagreeable taste in the mouth, sour ; watery
eyes ; urine clear ; bowels moved twice a day ; looks
very pale.

Ordered him Nat. mur. 6 trit. six grains in water twice
a day.

Having taken twenty-four of such powders he paused a
few days and returned stating that the chilliness had quite
disappeared and also the postprandial drowsiness, the black
spots had quite disappeared but were returning again a
little, the sour taste was gone, the watery state of the
eyes as bad as ever, the urine had become cloudy.

In this case the medicine was evidently quite homoeo-
pathic to the condition of the patient, and it is manifest
that the Nat. mur. 6 profoundly affected his organism,
as the chilliness of more than two years' duration quite
disappeared, as also the after-dinner drowsiness.

Of course these sensations may not be indicative of
profound organic lesions, but they are not indicative of
a normal condition either, but the evidence of drug action
does not hang on this. The symptom that brought him
to me was the postprandial drowsiness, as it materially
interfered with his business in the afternoon (he dines .
early). He formerly lived in Tranmere and then always
felt this drowsiness ; he afterwards came to live in Birken-
head itself and during his residence here did not feel it,

20

but on removing again to Tranmere the old drowsiness
re-appeared and he thought he would have to leave the
neighbourhood to get rid of the troublesome symptom.
The billionth dilution of Sodium chloride has saved him
this trouble.

Was it faith that cured him of his drowsiness and chilli-
ness ? If so, what rendered his water cloudy ? Besides,
this was our conversation.

Was that a kind of salt you gave me, doctor ? ''

Why?

Because I showed the prescription to my old school-
master and he said you were giving me salt.''

Yes. It was salt in what we homoeopaths call the
6th centesimal trituration, i.e. the billionth dilution.

“ Do you think it can have had anything to do with
my chilliness and drowsiness going away : could it have
affected the circulation and liver (his theories) like that ? "

A broad grin was on his face when he put the last
question ; then he checked himself and apologized for
it. No one will, I opine, maintain that an open mouth
with a broad grin are specially expressive of faith that
worketh a cure of chilliness of two years' duration.

When formerly living in Tranmere and suffering from
this postprandial lethargy he was treated allopathically
and homoeopathically for it without avail, the latter
treatment included that wonderful vegetable mercury.
Podophyllum peltatum given because ''it was liver".
Do we not all know that Podo. is good for the liver ?
That being so the livers of very many people must be
preternaturally good, for a veritable podophyllomania
has been raging for years under the commercial ticket of
" homoeopathic

Microscopical sections of the livers of some of these
Podophyllum-edXers might be instructive as showing the
pathological outcome of direct liver irritation ; the gin-
drinker's liver we know, the Podophyllum-editev’s liver
awaits an histographer.

There is one thing to be said in favour of the Podo-
phyllum-givexs : they are impartial and give it to all alike.

But this is digressive.

Here let me note that I have noticed that some of the
Natrum Muriaticum affections are worse in cold^ and better
in warm weather.

21

Obs. XV. — Lad of 12 came under observation on
March 30th, 1878, suffering from a group of symptoms
that collectively are conveniently called Phlyctenular
ophthalmia. The left eye was spasmodically closed from
the photophobia. A month before he had caught a cold
m this eye, and it had remained closed, inflamed and
painful ever since, and was not getting any better. On
everting the lids an ulcer in the cornea is observed,
resulting evidently from a burst phlyctenula of about
the size of a split pea. The dimness of vision from this
ulcer determined the parents to seek advice, they fearing
the '' eye '' was being affected. To leave an ophthalmia
for a month without seeking advice is a phenomenon
that will greatly surprise many, but not medical men.

The prominent symptom in the case was the great
lachrymation, and this is very characteristic of NatrUm
munaticum. So six grains of Nat. mar. 6 trituration
was given in water three times a day.

April 6th. Opens his eye wide and sees quite clearly ;
the photophobia, pain, inflammation and lachrymation
gone ; the ulcer nearly so.

Continue the medicine.

Excepting some very faint leucomatic streaks the cure
was complete in a few more days.

Patient had formerly been long under my treatment
for caries of the petrous portion of left temporal bone,
and had got quite well of it.

Sodium chloride has an ancient reputation as an anti-
scrofulosum, as we all know.

Obs. XVI. — Boy of 9, with ganglion on leg of the size
pf a small hen's egg. Has Been under my treatment
for many months with no good result except very slight
amelioration from Sticta pulmonaria. Silicea did no
good. On Dr. Schiissler's recommendation [Abgekurzte
Therapie, Vierte Auflage, p. 46, Oldenburg, 1878), I
gave Nat mur. 6, six grains in water night and morning.

Three months later I received by letter the following
report : — '' The swelling on the little boy's leg, I am glad
to say is much better — a good deal smaller, now about
the size of a small nut, and rather more in its original
position — ^not so much under the knee joint as it was."

Continue the medicine.

22

Obs. XVII. — Lady, aet. 63. Regular gout in left big
toe and foot. Patient is fond of beer.

R Nat, mur, 6 trit. Six grains every two hours.

In four days all symptoms had disappeared. Here I iid
order her to leave off her beer, but was , . . not obeyed.

Patient since this keeps a stock of these powders on
hand, and calls them her '' gout powders ; they have
since promptly relieved two or three similar attacks,
as I learn from her daughter.

Since treating this case I have used Nat. mitr. 6 trit.
frequently repeated, in several other cases of gout, with
very great satisfaction indeed.

Query : Does the remedy cause an increased elimina-
tion of the urate of sodium ? I think it probable.

Obs. XVIII. — April 21st, 1878. John H., aet. 29,
seaman, had fever and ague two or three times a day,
with watery vomiting, in Calcutta, in September, 1877.
Was in the Calcutta Hospital three weeks for it, and took
emetics, quinine and tonics. Left at the end of the
three weeks cured ; but before he was out of port the
ague returned, or he got another, and he had a five month
voyage home to the port of Liverpool. During the
first three months of this homeward voyage he had two,
three, four, five attacks a week, and took a great deal of
a powder from the captain, which, from his description,
was probably Cinchona bark, then the fever left him, and
the following condition supervened, viz., Pain in right
side under the ribs ; cannot lie on right side ; both calves
very painful to touch, they are hard and stiff ; left leg
semiflexed, he cannot stretch it.'’ In this condition he
was two months at sea, and two weeks ashore ; and in
this condition he comes to me hobbling with the aid of
a stick, and in great pain from the moving.

Urine muddy and red ; bowels regular ; skin tawny ;
cqnjunctivae yellow.

Drinks about three pints of beer daily. I recommend
him not to alter his mode of life till he is cured, and then
to drink less beer. The former part of the recommenda-
tion he followed, as I learned from his brother ; of the
latter part I have no information.

Obs. XL bears directly on this one, we having evidently
to do with an ague suppressed with Cinchona, Therefore

23

ordered Nat. mur. 6 trit. Six grains in water every four
hours.

April 27th. — Pain in side and leg went away entirely
in three days, and the water cleared at once ; but the pain
returned on the fourth day in the left calf only, which
to-day is red, painful, swelled and pits. He walks
without a stick.

Continue medicine.

May 4th. — ^Almost well ; feels only a very little pain
in left calf when walking. Looks and feels quite well,
and walked into room with perfect ease without any stick.

He thinks he had a cold shake a few nights ago. He
continues to perspire every night ; ever since he got the
ague the sheets have to be changed every night.
Continue medicine.

May nth. — Quite well. No medicine.

July 20th. — Continues well.

The last two reports were obtained by me from his
relations, he, being well, not thinking it worth while
(notwithstanding his promise to report himself) to come
again after the third visit on May 4th.

Considering that patient had been a fortnight here on
shore before coming to me, it is not probable that his rapid
cure after taking the Nat. mur. was due to the climate.
Still this is the weak point in the case, if it have any.

Patient and doctor both think the medicine wrought
the cure ; others may think differently.

It is to be noted that the salt provisions and sea air
during a voyage did not cure it.

Obs. XIX. — Mrs. B., aet. 53. For four or five weeks
cold shakes many times a day and night, beginning in the
slioiHders like cold creeps, and going down the back
and then all over ; cold creeps in legs in bed at night ;
head cold and sweafy ; nauseous taste in mouth ; great
sleeplessness these four or five weeks, viz. wakes at
2 a.m., and is unable to get off to sleep again.

She is very tearful ; merely describing Her symptoms
brings tears into her eyes.

B Nat. mur. 6 trit. Six grains in water every four
hours.

On my calling a few days later to see how she was
progressing, I got the foUowina- rennrt • —

24

creeps and shakes left off after the first powder/' (She
speaks of the powders subsequently as those powders
that made me warm ".) Feels altogether warmer now,
not like the same, and sleeps well. She never had ague.

Two months after this I had occasion to see her
daughter, when patient (the mother) said, '' Those
powders did me so much good that I have been better
than I had been for years.''

Subsequent to the cure I thought I should like to know
whether patient was in the habit of partaking of salt
with her food ; and on enquiring was much astonished
to hear the following statement from her : —

About a year ago I was recommended by a friend
to take a good deal of salt, as she thought it would be
good for me, and since then I have taken about one-and-
a-half teaspoonfuls a day often spread on bread."

Query : Was this a case of chronic salt poisoning
antidoted by its own dynamide ?

This is a most interesting observation indeed. Here
we have a lady who in addition to partaking of salt in the
ordinary way with her food, and in her food, had actually
partaken of one-and-a-half teaspoonfuls of salt daily
for a twelvemonth, and was even still doing so during the
cure, and yet the very first powder of triturated salt wrought
such a marked change. The difference in the look of
the patient was also remarkable : at my first visit she
canie to me in her drawing room with a shawl over her
shoulders, and looking evidently cold ; at my second
visit only a few days later she wore no shawl, and was
quite free from any chilly feeling.

This lady suffered for years from Angina pectoris (true
breast-pang), and had been given up by members of both
schools to the brandy bottle ; but under my treatment
(extending over two years) she made a complete recovery,
having been now quite well of it these i8 months.

Obs. XX. — Mrs. W., aet. 6o. Came under treatment
for coldness of the legs from the knees to the feet, for three
months; she cannot keep them warm in any manner;
at night she wraps them up in flannel, and encases them
also by day, but still they are cold ; the coldness i^
subjective but not objective ; she suffers also very much

fromi^leeples sne ss^

s^|and great nervous irritability/

25

B Nat. mur. 6 trit.

At the next visit a few weeks afterwards she reported
that she had been promptly cured of her old insomnia,
and also of the coldness of the legs, but the legs were not
as she would like, the coldness having given place to a
burning feeling, especially in the veins of the part, which
now swell. She no longer wraps up or encases her legs,
but on the contrary they are almost too warm.

To continue the medicine.

The cure was permanent. The medicine so improved
her nervous state that she still speaks of it as the powders
that soothed her nerves

Obs. XXL — Constipation, of long standing, in a pale
anaemic young lady of 23 ; only one motion in two or three
Hays.

E Nat. mur. 6 trit. Twenty-four six-grain powders,
one in water forenoon and afternoon.

This one set of powders quite cured it ; there is now
daily stool. Also the menses came on a week late [very
unusual), and the usual painfulness was absent ; they
were also not so excessive as usual.

Obs. XXII . — A gentleman, aet. 60, with ^.oederna of
the praeputium for some weeks ; severe intertrigo
between thighs and scrotum, with a good deal of acrid
discharge, and considerable excoriation ; this condition
has existed for many months, notwithstanding daily
ablutions often several times repeated. Patient is
arthritic and very melancholy and despondent.

His skin is very dusky and unhealthy looking.

E Nat. mur. 6 trit. Six grains four times a day.

In a week the oedema and intertrigo were nearly well,
and he was in very much better spirits, and at the end
of the second week he was well. He continues well,
and the skin of his face is lighter in colour, but the colour
of that of the trunk remains as before. The change in
his mood was quite remarkable.

Obs. XXIII. — Gentleman of 35. Pain in left side of ^
lower jaw extending to the end tooth of left upper jaw,
anS’ up to the left eye, always after food, throbbing
wrencmng pain, making the tears conie into his eyes:; the
pain he describes as terrible, and it lasts about ah hour.

26

He has been in this condition for three months, which
coincides with his leaving Liverpool and coming to reside
in Tranmere.

Urine high coloured and thick.

The pain evidently proceeds from a decayed tooth.

He sleeps well after the after-supper pain has gone.

B Nat, mur, 6 trit. Six grains in water three times a
day.

In a week he reported : Pain much better, it comes on
and lasts only five or six minutes, and no tears come into
his eyes.

To continue the medicine.

The next report was that just as he thought he was
cured he caught a slight cold, and the pain came on in
all its original violence, when a dentist relieved him of
both tooth and pain.

Goes under treatment for haemorrhoids. The fact
that the pain returned in all its original violence is only
what we should expect under the circumstances, and it
militates against the case as one of permanent cure,
but does not invalidate the evidence of the potent drug
action.

Obs. XXIV.— a gouty gentleman; of 70. Until three
years ago he was in the habit of perspiring freely, but
latterly he perspires less, and for three years he has always
felt, chilly and cold.

Urine bloody and thick ; he urinates with great
difficulty,, and uses the catheter at night these two years.

He takes Nat. mur. 6 trit. for three weeks, and reports
that after the first day or two he ceased using the catheter
altogether, having sufficient power over the bladder ;
the urine is free from blood and slime, but stiU thick,
but not so red or brick-dusty ; he is more costive than
usual, and feels considerably warmer.

He begs to go on with the medicine, to which I agree.

He did not consult me again, but when he came to pay
his little bill he informed me that he had gradually got
quite well of his chilliness, that his urine had become
normal, and that he no longer needed to pass the catheter
at all.

The urine may possibly have come right of itself, and
passing the catheter those two years may have been a

27

mere habit and unnecessary ; but how are we to account
for the disappearance of the cold, chilly sensation that
had lasted three years ?

Obs. XXV. — Gentleman of 50, usually enjoying good
health, and of splendid physique. Symptoms ; For the
last six weeks coldness of the abdomen, from the navel
downwards, including the genitals ; swelling of the
abdomen after late dinner, with flatulence ; passes a
very large quantity of water with a strong odour ; it
does not contain any sugar ; he is cold about the legs,
and is restless at night, with cold creeps from navel
down the legs ; as he sits on the sofa before me, I notice
that he holds both his hands tight over the pubes ; and to
the enquiry why he does so, he replies that he is so cold
about those parts that he holds his hands there to warm
them. The sensation is as if his shirt were wet and cold ;
when he urinates it seems as if he would never leave
off for the dribbling. Fearful thirst of mouth, not
of the stomach ; bowels regular; tongue coated, breath
fouh Very despondent of himself.

Takes vapour baths regularly. Here the chilliness,
profuse urination and thirst seem the prominent symptoms
and, as we all know, they are those of Natrum muriatimm.

B Nat. mur. 6 trit. gr. vj. Fiat pulv. Tales xxiv.

One in water four times a day.

Eight days later : The coldness a great deal better ;
does not pass quite so much water, and its smell is less
bad ; the coldness of legs better a great deal, as also
that of the pubic parts ; the thirst is also much better,
so also the tongue ; breath sweet ; feels better all over ;
warmer.

Is anxious to continue the medicine, which is done.

He did not come again, so I wrote to him to enquire
how he was doing, and received a reply to the effect
that the second lot of powders had finished the cure,
except a little thirst, for which he intended coming to see
me again, but he never did.

From a mutual acquaintance I learn he continues
weU.

In this case the amelioration commenced immediately
after the powders were taken, and as far as I can see the ^
cure can be attributed to them onlv.

This, critical reader, is the way I have wandered in
my search after truth as it is in nature ; from it I am
forced against my will to admit the existence of a some-
thing in drugs that becomes operative by trituration.
What it is, I do not know ; what you call it, I do not
care.

Mach's nach, aber mack's besser.

HEAULEY BROTHERS, lOQ KINGSWAY, LONDON, W.C.2 ; AND ASHFORD, KENT

AS

GUNPOWDER
A WAR REMEDY

Gunpowder

as a

War Remedy

JOHN H. CLARKE, M.D.

I B. A., M. Do fi\ J

I Hommopatk & Besearohsr. ii'

THE HOMCEOPATHIC PUBLISHING COMPANY
12, Warwick Lane, London, E.C.

New York Office : 395, Broadway

PREFACE

My authority having been cited in the Evening
Standard, Daily Mirror, and other journals for the
recommendation of Gunpowder as an all-round
remedy for blood-poisoning in general and septic war-
wounds in particular, I think I shall best serve the
public interest by putting the facts about the remedy
into separate practical shape and thus making them
accessible to all.

In the following pamphlet will be found all the
information necessary for the practical use and under-
standing of the remedy, and I think that the directions
are so clear and simple that any intelligent person,
lay or medical, will be able to put them into practice.

JOHN H. CLARKE.

8, Bolton Street, W.
August 4th, 1915.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

PAGE

How Gunpowder is to be Taken - . - ^

CHAPTER II

The Constitution and Therapeutic Power of
Gunpowder - - - - - - 1 1

CHAPTER III

Examples of the Curative Action of Gun-
powder 21

CHAPTER IV

Concluding Remarks

29

Gunpowder

as a

War Remedy

CHAPTER L

How Gunpowder is to be Taken,

So much interest has been evoked by an article of
mine which appeared in the HomoBOpathic World of
January last, entitled “Gunpowder for Gunners,”
that I have thought well to write out a full account of
Gunpowder in this somewhat novel aspect of its many
utilities, which, so far as history tells, was undreamed
of by its discoverer, the alchemist friar, Roger Bacon.

The Form in which it may be Taken.

In the first place it may be advisable to say a few
words about the form in which the remedy may be
taken. In the old days of black powder, gunpowder

8

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

was recognised by our soldiers as a remedy for certain
forms of suppuration, and by them it was taken crude
in teaspoonful doses mixed in hot water. It is also
used crude by shepherds, as the Rector of Stradbroke
has told us, sprinkled on bread and cheese, to cure and
prevent wound-poisoning acquired in shearing and
handling sheep.

But crude gunpowder is neither a convenient nor
a pleasant remedy to take, though I have no authority
for stating that it would not be efficacious. The pre-
paration I have most frequently used is the homoeo-
pathic third decimal (3x) trituration, either prescribed
in the form of powders or of compressed tablets. For
war purposes the last are the most convenient. In this
form I find gunpowder a most powerful and efficacious
remedy. The 3x trituration is what is called a “ low
attenuation,” that is to say, it is not highly infini-
tesimal but it is sufficiently so to have lost all taste
or smell of crude gunpowder, and to be in no sort
of way explosive.

Dosage and Directions for Use.

The great sphere of action of gunpowder is in cases
of septic suppurationy-or, in other words — of wounds

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

9

that have become poisoned with the germs of putre-
faction. My directions in such cases are as follows : —
One tablet every two hours^ when there is fever.

Two tablets three or four times a day when the
temperature is normal.

But Gunpowder may also be used as a prophylactic*
That is to say, it will not only cure septic suppuration
when present, but it wi ll afford such protection to the
organism against harmful germs, that wounds will be
less likely to become septic in one who is under its
influence. For this purpose I recommend —

As a prophylactic ojie tablet to be taken once a day.
Judging from analogy I should expect that this
would also afford protection against other forms of
blood-poisoning, as well as against poisoned wounds.
One tablet of Gunpowder a day is no hardship or
difficulty for anybody. I should think it ought to
prove effective against the infection of spotted fever,
of\cerebro-spinal meningitis./' If this disease actually
appears in any locality, I should advise all who are
quartered in that locality to take —

One tablet three times a day.

In the case of"^; boils, carbuncles,!;* and other skin
affections, including*ieczema, abscesses,, rtvhether septic
or not, blood-poisoning from \bites of insects

10

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

i ptomaine poisoning from food that has been im-
■ properly preserved, I should prescribe —

A

One tablet every hour or two hours according to the
urgency of the symptoms.

The same dosage would apply in the case of illness
from any of the protective inoculations or vaccinations
that are now in such vogue.

The portability of the remedy in this form is another
recommendation in its favour. An ounce bottle con-
tains i6o tablets. Thus, without perceptibly
adding to the weight or bulk of his kit any soldier
can carry with him as much as he is likely to need.

Any homoeopathic chemist will be able to supply the
tablets. My own chemists, Messrs. Epps, 6o, Jermyn
Street, S.W., have already sent out a quantity to the
front.

CHAPTER II.

The Constitution and Therapeutic Power of
Gunpowder.

The Gunpowder with which we are concerned is the
traditional Black Gunpowder, whose three cardindl
constituents are sulphur, carbon, and nitre or salt-
petre. Modern smokeless gunpowder is of a different
composition. As sulphur, carbon, and saltpetre are
three potent medicines well known to pharmacy and
physic, it is not surprising that a combination of the
three should also be a medicine of great potency.
There is a certain piquancy in the fact that gunpowder
is a remedy for the accidents of warfare; but some
instinct put into the minds of our soldiers of long ago
that gunpowder could cure as well as kill. The
Indian s of North America and Canada have found
in ifka remedy for snake-bites./ The shepherds of East
Anglia, as already mentioned, use it extensively in
treating their flocks and themselves for wounds and
Wood-poisoning of many kinds, and for protecting
themselves against wound infection.

12

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

In the second volume of my Dictionary of Materia
Medica, published in 1902, I have referred to some
uses of Gunpowder in my article on Saltpetre
(“ Kali nitricum ”), recording also some experiments
made with it on myself. But my knowledge of the
power of Gunpowder over blood-poisoning I owe to a
graphic article contributed to the Homoeopathic World
in igii by the Rector of Stradbroke, Suffolk, the Rev.
Roland Upcher, entitled “ Notes on the Use of Gun-
powder (Black).” “ For the last forty years,” wrote
Mr. Upcher, “ I have known and observed from per-
sonal experiment the effects of Black Gunpowder as
a remedy for various kinds of blood-poisoning. The
symptoms of poisoning, which call for Black Gun-
powder are almost invariably’^abscesses or boils^r

'^exaggerated swelling^of the poisoned limb, accom-
panied witll^discoloration of the skin,/so that the arm
from the tips of the fingers to the axillary glands is
almos^of a purple or black tint./ In such cases I have
found Black Gunpowder, whether in large or small
doses, acts like magic.”

Mr. Upcher tells the story of how he came by the
discovery. ” My father, a country rector in Norfolk,
used to add to his light duties in a small parish the

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

13

recreation of farming the glebe, and as there was
a good lot of pasture, kept sheep. He noticed that
at the time of paring the sheeps’ feet suffering from
foot-rot, his shepherds were continually subjected to
blood-poisoning, which was more or less (less, I fear I)
successfully treated by local doctors. But it generally
ended in the said shepherd having to give up his work
and turn his hand to something else. However, at
last there came a shepherd, who, year in and year
out, never did get blood-poisoning! ” This greatly
astonished the rector, and he asked his shepherd how
be accounted for the fact. The latter invited his
master to come and see him at his afternoon meal,
or “ fourses ” as the Norfolk people call it. He duly
went, and found him sitting under a hedge eating
bread and what looked like black cheese. “ Why,
Harry,” he exclaimed, “whatever are you eating?
It looks like black cheese.” “No, master,” was the
reply, “ that b’aint black cheese, but that is white
cheese kivered with black gunpowder, and that’s what
keeps out the pison, that’s what dew the trick — I
never gets no pison.”

In course of' time this shepherd got promoted to a
better position, and his successor soon got into trouble
when the feet-paring season came round. The

14

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY,

shepherd’s arm was swollen and almost black from
finger-tips to armpit. The Rector did not trouble
the faculty this time, but undertook the case himself.
He mixed a dessertspoonful of gunpowder in half a
tumbler of water, making a paste of it first, and gradu-
ally adding the water afterwards, and administered
the whole in one dose ! Result — a brilliant and rapid
cure. From that time on the Rector’s shepherds took
gunpowder with their cheese, and blood-poisoning
disappeared.

But the lesson did not stop there. The Rector
could not keep a good thing like that to himself, and
as in duty bound, let his parish have the benefit of
the discovery. “ Many a time,” says his son, “ have
I been dosed, as a child, boy, and even young man,
with the family patent medicine : boils,, carbuncles,
eruptions caused by suspected blood-poisoningf, one
and all had to climb down to the Black Gunpowder.”
As with the family so with the parish — all conditions
of men, women, and children, and even animals, were
treated by the good Rector with the same remedy and
the same success.

Rector II,, the present Mr. Upcher, used the
homoeopathic preparation of Gunpowder — the one
with which I experimented on myself. This is at

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

15

once more convenient and more pleasant than crude
Gunpowder, and no less potent for curative purposes.

From my knowledge of the properties of sulphur,
carbon, and saltpetre individually, I had no doubt
whatever that the observations of the shepherds and
their spiritual pastors %vere thoroughly sound. The
whole art of curative medicine may be said to lie in
one thing — correctly reading indications. When a
case presents itself for treatment, there are generally
a hundred remedies more or less applicable to the case.
In order to select the best of the bunch, it is essential
to be able to read correctly the manifestations — signs
and symptoms — of the patient. It is very easy to make
too much of one symptom and too little of another, and
so miss the particular drug that is required.

Now Ae great point a^bout Gunpowder is that it has
a broad and clear indication that hardly anyone can
miss^blood-poisoning. f Soldiers found it ; shepherds
found it; American-Indians found it. An ordinary
cut or wound in a healthy person heals quickly. But
if a morbid virus is introduced, or if the person’s blood
is impure or of low vitality, the part swells, suppura-
tion ensues, and the limb may be threatened. Or if a
limb is bitten by a poisonous snake, the same thing
happens, only more rapidly, and the constitutional

1 6 GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

symptoms are more rapid in development. Or,
poisonous matter of some kind may be introduced into
the system by other ways — breathing foul air, drink-
ing polluted water, or eating tainted food. The
poison quickly finds its way into the blood — boils,
carbuncles, eruptions, abscesses, or other manifesta-
tions appear, showing unmistakably that the blood
has been poisoned. To all these conditions Gun-
powder acts as an antidote.

It may be asked, In what way does it act ? Does it
exercise an antiseptic action and kill the germs? In
a certain degree there is some such action. Carbon
and sulphur, with sulphur derivatives such as
sulphurous acid, are very potent antiseptics and germ
destroyers. But the amount of these taken in the
preparations used in my cases is quite insufficient
to exert a direct germ-killing action. But Gun-
powder, in the homoeopathic attenuations, so acts on
the blood as to render it antiseptic, or, more strictly
speaking, to assist or increase its normal antiseptic
action. For the healthy living blood is a potent germ-
destroyer, and the reason why all persons do not
succumb to infection when epidemics are abroad is
that the blood of those who escape is equal to killing
the germs which attack them.

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

17

It may be asked : How can an infinitesimal amount
of Gunpowder, or of anything else for that matter,
effect this ? To answer this fully one would need to
explain the secret of life itself. However, we know a
good deal about life; and the phenomena connected
with Radium are capable of throwing a little light on
the subject. Substances, when undergoing the process
of graduated attenuation of the homoeopathic method,
while losing their coarse physical properties, acquire
others which are somewhat closely analogous to the
properties of radium. In this way: a substance
which has been in contact with radium, through the
action of the radium rays, becomes itself radiant. So,
the homoeopathically attenuated substances are raised
to a higher pitch of vibration and become capable of
conveying their vibrations to the persons wno take
them, just as radium can convey its vibrations to
bodies in contact with it.

Be this as it may (and it must be confessed that all
attempted “ explanations ” of the phenomena of life
are at bottom unsatisfying), the fact remains that
Gunpowder, taken in minute quantities, enables the
blood to get rid of disease germs which the
constituents of Gunpowder in substantial amounts
would kill if added to the same in a test-tube.

i8

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

Fortunately, it is facts and not explanations that we
have to deal with. Most explanations, amount to little
more than a re-statement of the problem in different
terms, which are constantly changing. But the facts
remain the same always for our use and constant
guidance.

I may be asked. What about antiseptics ? Are not
they sufficient ? Now, I have no sort of objection to
antiseptics in themselves. Antiseptic, or, rather,
aseptic surgery, is a very great advance on older
methods. But the use of antiseptics is largely
dependent on the germ-theory, and the germ-theory
is only one side of the question. The vital question
is the other and, as I think, the larger side. The
cases in which it is impossible to keep or make wounds
aseptic by external applications are innumerable.
Besides, it is quite possible to hinder healiner by their
use. For in order to kill any germs present in a
wound it may be necessary to apply an antiseptic in
such strength as to lower the vitality of the injured
part. This explains why many wounds refuse to heal
under the most careful antiseptic treatment. It is
for this reason that the practice of so acting on the
blood as to increase its own vitality is infinitely
superior, \For local dressings J prefer plain sterilised

GUNPOWn^^

A WAR REMEDY,

19

lint after cleansing
aiU. with pure boii^ ^

(the Com,^ O'

(Witch Hazel) has he, "

teaspoonful to the ha,!* “

adjuncts; but the Tbese ate ttery useful

and this will act in ^ “i” 'W"*.

... of all sorts of unfavourable

conditions.

Mr. Roland Upch^

, .f began his experiments with

Gunpowder itself, aod

, ^ben followed these with the

lower homoeopatnic pj.

la. , +u ^P^rations. The ix trituration
is equal to .1 m the .

thes ^‘ttial scale; 2X is .ox, and 3x
is .001, or one thous^

TT t. • aso Vaic part of the crude. Mr.

Upcher gives his reas^^ . . ,

u- • * .aso rtf r',. for believing in the thera-
peutic virtues ot 'jUnp„ ^

. . j 1 rxetasa.*- ^^er bv a consideration of the

individual properties ^

, . a a. c 1 its constituents. After

remarking that bulpi^

. . ^ *s a well-known remedy for

boils, eruptions, itch

, ’ Eczema, and suppressed im-
purities and eruptions . a, , ’

. Oaf Carbon Carbo vegetabths)

covers very similar q, “

that Saltpetre (Kah

nitncum) has a powerj, ,

. i. * action on the skin, opening

the pores ; he quotes th^ , ,

f ,jr . . 0 following passage from my
Dictionary of Materia & r o

a . , a- f eaU Medicu, Vol. II., page 14^1

“ A solution of saltpetf-

, t • aaf-aua-aa Ro applicatioH wus Rtt old

remedy for inveterate n,

^Onge in cats. Saltpetre with

20

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

carbon and sulphur forms Gunpowder. A teaspoon-
ful of this in hot water was a favourite remedy for
go norrho ea among soldiers in the days when
black gunpowder was used. In some experiments
made by myself with Gunpowder 2x severe herpes
facialis involving right eyebrow and right side of
the nose developed.” Mr. Upcher adds that from
his experience of Gunpowder in the cure of herpes, he
can verify the correctness of my experiment on myself.
In selecting Gunpowder 3X for my therapeutic
work instead of lower attenuations I have perhaps
been influenced by the experiment above alluded to.
I carry the marks of it to the present day, and I have
no wish to repeat the experiment on anyone else.
Gunpowder 3X has hitherto answered my expectations
without causing any unpleasant by-results.

CHAPTER III.

Examples of the Curative Action of Gunpowder.

In addition to the cases related by Mr. Upcher it
may be of interest to record a few of my own. First,
I will give that of the gunner, whose case I related
in the article already referred to. It will be noticed
that in this case I gave other remedies besides Gun-
powder, but the progress of the case showed that the
Gunpowder was the chief agent in the curative work.

J. S., 30, a non-commissioned artillery officer
in an Indian regiment, who had been born in India
of English parents, and had never before left it,
presented himself to me on April 9th, 1913, in a fairly
desperate condition. He was a man of very powerful
physique, but his flesh was hanging about him, and
he was covered from head to foot wiA sor^, some
discharging, some having rupia-like crusts, copper-
coloured stains marking the areas where sores or
“ boils had previously been.

His story was as follows. About two years before
he had had an%outbreak of “ boils, and six months

22

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

later another attack. At intervals of four or five
months he had other attacks, ending up with the
present one. All attempts to cure him having failed,
he was advised that the only thing for him was a
voyage to England and a change of air. H. J. S. was
greatly valued by his superiors. He was an instructor
in athletics, a total abstainer, and an expert gunner.
In order that he might not lose his pay whilst absent
from India, his officers had very kindly arranged for
him a course of instruction at Woolwich. He had
been six weeks in England when he came to me.

So far from the change benefiting him, he had
become steadily worse. He had had diarrhoea during
the voyage home. His digestion was bad and his
^leep broken by the pains of his sores. He had lost
two stones in weight in four weeks; altogether he had
lost five stones. The neck, trunk, extremities were
all affected. The inguinal glands were much swollen
gjid painful.

On trying to get at the origin of the trouble, I
ascertained that his previous health had been excel-
lent. But in 1894 he had beei^itten the finger by
la squirrelAnd his finger had been bad for a long time

"i- -• - -'-.fi'i

afterwards. This showed a degree of susceptibility to
blood-poisoning. He had had attacks of fever, but

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

23

almost always in association with the attacks of
“boils.” The first attack occurred the end of
November, 1911. At the end of the previous October
\he had been vaccinated/ior the second time in his life,
and it took well.’’ It did, indeed! To me, the
connection was obvious between the present state and
the vaccination.

41- --

At the same time as my patient, a fellow soldier
was also vaccinated, and he also soon afterwards
became ill, in a somewhat similar way. But this man
was not temperate in his habits, and his illness was
put down to alcohol by his medical officers. This
would not do for my patient, who was a life abstainer.
The only other hypothesis was — syphilis. The
possibility of this he steadily denied, and his word
was borne out by the Wassermann tests, which con-
sistently gave negative results, though tried again
and again. My diagnosis was unhesitatingly —
Vaccinosis, secondary or tertiary. This was con-
firmed by the fact that , the sores were thickest and
lasted longest on Ms right arm on the site of the
vaccination scars. The fact that his right arm was
worse, was explained by his doctors as being due to
over-exertion at cricket, bowling, etc. !

I ordered himH^unpowder 3x/eight grains three
times a day ; and^Thuja 200/three doses in the week.

24

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

At the end of the week he was a changed man. He
had still plenty of sores, but they were healing, and
the whole aspect of the man was different. His
appetite had improved to such an extent that some
indigestion and diarrhoea had resulted from over-
indulgence. His skin had improved altogether in
appearance. On April 24th his weight was lost nibs.
He had then gained much, but I have no record of
his weight when he first came to me. On June 5th
he was list, iijlbs., and on September i8th,
i2st. 6Jlbs. He had steadily improved all this time.
New swellings or “ boils ” occasionally appeared, and
some sores with thickening on the hands, just below
the wrists, especially the right, had proved particularly
obstinate. I now omitted Gunpowder and gave
instead i^Silica 3x/in eight-grain doses in the same
'way,%Thuja 200^thrice a week, being continued .as
before.

A rapid change took place. A new outbreak of
boils occurred, diarrhoea set in, with bitter taste and
coated tongue and some fever. The diarrhoea was
worse after drinking milk. The weight had gone
down to list. 81bs., but the hands were much better.
Jrombid. 20oisoon cured the diarrhoea, and then I
gave\punpowder 3x/eight grains every four hours

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

25

alone ; leaving oflf the Thuja. On October i6th he was
very much better again in every way, his weight having
gone up to i2st. ajlbs. Soon after this, his time
being expired, he left for India after successfully com-
pleting his course of instruction, in very good con-
dition. I gave him a good supply of Gunpowder to
take home with him, and told him to let me know if
he had any relapse. As I have heard nothing since,
I conclude he is now busy with his guns somewhere
in the widespread area of the war.

Here are a few other cases of mine : —

Poisoned Bite.

A lady, who had a very sensitive skin, was
bitten by a gnat on the foot, resulting in swelling,
inflammation and suppuration. There was a ring of
inflammation round the bite, constantly spreading and
detaching the epidermis as it spread. After the failure
of several remedies. Gunpowder 3X eight grains three
times a day rapidly cured.

Poisoned Cut.

A gentleman had a bad cut with a knife on the
left index finger. The wound refused to heal. An

26

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

inflammatory ring stripped off the epidermis and
spread more and more. Lachesis and other remedies
failed to make any impression. Gunpowder 3 x
rapidly "cured.

> Sewer-Gas Poisoning.

A lady was very severely poisoned by sewer-
gas. There followed swelling of the right arm and
axillary glands of the right side. When she con-
sulted me, three months after the accident, the right
arm was almost fixed at the elbow-joint with swelling.
It threatened suppuration above and below. The
axillary glands were as large as a hen’s egg. Gun-
powder 3x gradually resolved the trouble, and though
the cure was interrupted by an attack of measles, the
mobility of the arm was fully restored.

The following case shows that as earthquakes and
war are placed in the same category of calamities,
Gunpowder may prove of service in some of the ills
caused by the one as well as the other.

, Blood-Poisoningvtrom Earthquake Dust/

In igi2 I had under my care a lady who had been
in the great earthquake which wrought so much havoc

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

27

in Jamaica some years before. She asked me if I
thought I could do anything for her little niece, aged
4, who lived in Jamaica and suffered from a skin
trouble. She was born soon after the earthquake, was
a very tiny child, had always been nervous, and
suffered, as many other children of the colony have
done since the earthquake, front eruptions on the skin.
It was as if the earthquake had thrown up from the
depths some new kind of irritant and poisonous
dust. The first symptoms were prickly heat,/' with
much itching. Then sores appeared, formingf blisters,^
the fluid of which had to be let out. The parts affected
were chiefly the ankles and the trunk. Every mosquito
bite made a poisoned wound. This little patient was
very languid, was nervous at night, and a restless
sleeper. These were the facts I elicited from her aunt.

I thought Gunpowder was the very thing for her,
and on January 4th, 1912, I sent her a supply of
powders of the 5X.

In due course I received a report that within a week
o*^ commencing the remedy she was much better. She
slept better, the bowels acted better, and as for her
appetite, whereas formerly she had to be coaxed to
eat anything, now they could not give her enough.
The skin improved at the same time. A second

28

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

course of powders was sent on April 30th as there
had been a relapse of the eruption with fever. From
this time she steadily improved and got perfectly well.

I may append to these an Editorial note from the
Homoeopathic World of June ist, relating the work
of another observer : —

Septic Inflammation of Thumb.

‘‘ More Gunpowder cases continue to come to hand.
The latest is of a septic inflammation of the thumb
in a nurse of 19. It was vigorously treated surgically,
and pus evacuated, but the inflammation continued,
and the loss of a joint was contemplated until a short
course of Gtmpowder 3X achieved a satisfactory heal-
ing and scarring.’’

CHAPTER IV.

Concluding Remarks.

I think it will be agreed that the evidence adduced
above is sufficient to warrant my recommendation of
Gunpowder as^a remedy of atoost universal applic-
ability in wounds of war. It has the additional advan-
tage of being, in the form recommended, whilst
powerful for good, as innocent of evil as brimstone-
and-treacle, castor oil, or Gregory's powder. In fact,
it is a perfectly safe domestic remedy. For that
reason I have no hesitation in commending it to the
notice of the public in general, civil as well as military.
In my opinion, if the use of it were universal through-
out the army at the front there would be infinitely
fewer septic wounds among our wounded, and those
wounds which become septic would heal in a vastly
shorter space of time.

It may be asked how I can be so certain, seeing that
I hold no oflficial position in the Army or Navy, and
have no opportunity of putting the remedy personally
to the test of practice on a large scale. In reply, let

30

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

me say that in medicine, as in warfare, the chance of
success very often lies in an intelligent anticipation of
the enemy’s intentions and capabilities. An ounce of
wisdom is often worth many tons of experience.
When cholera invaded Europe a little over a century
ago the medical world was divided into two camps —
the followers of Hahnemann on the one side, and all
the rest on the other. Before the epidemic arrived
reports of cases of the disease were bought and
published. From the symptoms described Hahne-
mann was able to name the remedies that were likely
to be called for. Consequently, his party, who exer-
cised intelligent anticipation of what was to come,
were all ready for action when the invasion occurred.
The other party, who may be called the party of the
** Wait-and-Sees,” never were ready, and lost over
70 per cent, of their patients, whilst the homoeopaths
saved over 70 per cent, of' theirs.

In our Services, so far as I know, there are only
Surgeon-captains, Surgeon-majors, Surgeon-colonels,
and Surgeon-generals. If there is such a person as a
Physician-general I must confess I never heard of
him. But whilst surgery is paramount in war
practice, and has reached a very high pitch of per-
fection, physicians’ work is very necessary also, and I

GUNPOWDER AS A WAR REMEDY.

31

believe this branch of practice is not by any means
so fully developed as the branch that belongs to
mechanical surgery. It is for this reason that I offer
this contribution to the neglected branch, and I do
not think any surgeon could object to such of his
patients as might like to do so treating themselves
to a few tablets of Gunpowder

UNNECESSARY TONSIL
OPERATIONS

Doctors often have things told them by their patients
which were never intended to reach their ears . Generally
these “repeats ” are more comical than serious. Such
happened to me last week. But such interference at
times has frightened patients, who drift hurriedly away
from a further consideration of Homoeopathy, without
giving it a fair trial.

A very dear friend told the father of two young patients
of mine what he ought to do for his two boys. This kind
of “free advice” happens all over the world. Their
nutrition had been seriously injured by an underlying
constitutional defect which had brought about abnormal
adenoids and enlarged tonsils, to such an extent that
a few months previously a school inspector had
“ordered” a $30 operation on each boy (a certain
doctor being recommended), otherwise their studies
would suffer and they could not be advanced to a
higher grade.

The father told my good friend that his boys were
under my care, and, moreover, they were nearly well
now, and that they had actually gained in weight, to
which my friend remarked that I was “very old-
fashioned” as I had opposed an operation, which
certainly I had done. Nevertheless .Baryta carbonica,
in 6x and 30th strengths, which I had prescribed for
both boys had reduced the abnormal local swellings and
had cured their husky nasal voices, etc., by correcting
their underlying ill-health, though there is still some
body weight to be made up by both boys to bring them
to absolute normality.

If adenoids and enlarged tonsils can be cured by
treating the constitution producing same in three months
by using the necessary Homoeopathic medicine, this not
always being Baryta carbonica, why have expensive
operations, which can never reach and cure the physical
condition which causes such abnormalities ?

well with their treatments. They have been found
wanting, which cannot be comforting to any patient of
theirs. Old works on Homoeopathy cost more now, if
such can be found, than when they were written. So
valuable were the close observations of our dead
exponents of Homoeopathic practice.

Remember that every British (and European)
Homoeopathic doctor was at first an orthodox man,
forsaking such because he learned the better value
of this Homoeopathy. This being the case, I am
glad to be classed as “very old fashioned”, and
so are all workers in Homoeopathy. It is really a
compliment.

The MS. of this article having been nearly typed I
find to-day that “Tonsils” form the leading feature
of the “Medicine” section of Time (the weeMy news
magazine for Sept. 24th, 1934, p. 51). The following
condensed extracts are culled from the American
Academy of Ophthalmology and Otolaryngology Con-
gress (orthodox) (eye, ear, nose and throat specialists)
who have lately met at Chicago.

Their findings constitute “the last word” on this
subject ! One Dr. A. David Kaiser, a professor of
Pediatrics (children’s diseases) states that : “Too much
is promised by physicians. Now the mother whose first
child has his tonsils removed when perhaps unnecessary,
is disappointed because the child continues to have colds,
and she does not want her second child’s tonsils removed,
although they are diseased ” (apparently overlooking it
is the child’s body which is diseased) . To continue the
quotation: “Having his tonsils out will make little
d^erence in his susceptibility to colds, and bronchitis
occurs more frequently in children so operated bn, qhd
the same is^ true of pneumonia. ..' Nonetheless the
'fl)?;’£'*femaTns that the fuhctiofi of the tonsils is not
understood.”

Time comments thus: “Tonsillectomy (cutting out
tonsils) used to be a ‘ kitchen chair ’ operation. Now in
the hands of the throat specialists it entails all the pomp
and ceremony of a ma j or operation . They make a pre-
operative examination of the patient’s skin, nose, throat,
ears, heart, lungs and kidneys. Any case with a tem-
perature above 100-4 has to be re-examined, and any
recent illness precludes this operation, besides which no

5

female patient is operated upon five days prior to or
during menstruation,” etc.

It would seem that nq ortliodox man sees any
necessity of considering the ailing body, which work
and science is seemingly left solely to the Homoeopaths.

Are you, the laity, ready to test Homoepathy in your
own family circle ? I implore your most earnest study
of this matter.

My brother orthodox practitioner ! I beg of you to
try Homoeopathy whenever you are in a quandary, and
perhaps have a case which is slipping — slipping out of
your hands, or downwards to death.

Your old leaders are beyond praying for, but you, the
rank and file, have a long life of medical struggle ahead
of you ; in a difficult case please try Homoeopathy
seriously, and as secretly as you like at first, but I beg of
you buy only a simple ‘ ‘ primer ” (or F amily 'Manual) at
first or you may become befogged, just as you would if
you had tried to understand advanced mathematics in
the nursery. Leave our philosophy strictly alone until
you have tested our rudiments. Any Homoeopathic
doctor will be pleased to talk things over with you.

Brother orthodox man, there are thousands of the laity
who are waiting and begging us for professional Homoeo-
pathic help, but these same know well the wheat from
the chaff. You simply cannot fool them, so learn your
Homoeopathy well.

You cannot be proud of your owm therapeutics, so
test the methods which the Homoeopaths are proud of
because our drugs do not fail us, if we know how to
choose the remedy ‘ ‘ according to Law ’ ’ . Wherever I
travel I find scores of the laity who have their own
medicine chests and who treat themselves, bewailing
the fact that there are not enough Homoeopathic
doctors available. So get wise unto yourself and study
Homoeopathy.

HOW To CURE INFLUENZA

That these epidemics will recur it is fair to assume.
In the meantime the wise thing to do is to study every
method to combat such a death-dealing force. It is the
stern duty of every orthodox doctor, and common
sense on the part of every family.

Though brevity is expected of me, I must fix the
reader’s attention on to what may be expected of
medicine, and this is best done by presenting some
statistics, comparing the death rates of this disease in
various hands. This concerns the laity more than the
profession, for their’s is the risk.

(1) Dr. W. A. Pearson, whom I have known well for
over twenty-five years, is Dean of the Hahnemann
Medical College of Philadelphia ; their hospital, of 592
beds, runs up twenty storeys in the heart of that city.
He has certified that he carefully collected records of
26,795 cases of epidemic ’flu, including 1918, treated by
homceopathic physicians, with the remarkably low
mortality rate of practically i per cent., whilst for the
same epidemics the Orthodox death rate was 30 per
cent. I talked with Dr. Pearson in 1934 and he stated
that the recurrent death rate averages still held for both
schools of medicine. He further told me that many
doctors, known personally to him, never lost a case,
unless such had previously been ‘ ‘ doped ’ ’ with Aspirin,
or such like heart-depressants before the cases were
transferred to homoeopathic care.

(2) Another set of statistics is to be found in the
International Homoeopathic Directory for 1932, which I
compiled (see page 220) . This can be obtained from the
publishers of this journal. These figures were collected
by Dr. T. A. McCann of Dayton, Ohio, who reported
same in his Presidential address before the seventy-
seventh Annual Congress of the American Institute of
Homoeopathy, held at Washington, D.C., June, 1921,
and these figures included that most fatal epidemic year
of 1918. 24,000 cases treated allopathically, that is
by orthodox men, had a fatality rate of 28 2 per cent.,

7

whereas, 26,000 cases treated by homoeopathic
physicians, including the 1918 epidemic, when their
death rate was 1-05 per cent, (also reported in the
Journal of the American Institute of Homoeopathy for
October, 1921).

(3) See Bulletin 43, Series II, for June 21st, 1934,
issued by the “ Bureau of Publicity " of the American
Foundation of Homoeopathy, at Washington D.C., and
read: “The tragic ’flu epidemic of 1918, an aftermath
of War, was for the most part fought by methods of
war (Aspirin and Quinine) when in orthodox hands the
death rate was roughly 48 per cent, and with strict
homoeopathic treatment the death rate was 3-95 per
thousand cases, or under four-tenths of i per cent."

This death rate is substantiated by an old friend of
mine from New York, a Dr. Guy Buckley Stearns, who
is now Associate Professor of Materia Medica of the New
York Homoeopathic Medical College, in a review of
16,913 cases with but sixty-seven deaths, that is with
homoeopathy without Aspirin.

The terrible difference shown in the death rates of the
two schools of medicine must be put down to our homoeo-
pathic medicines and to our method of selecting same.
Dr. Stearns dwells on the ever-changing methods of the
orthodox with their palliatives, sedatives, narcotics,
fever-breakers, purgatives and alcoholic stimulants,
which are one and all thoroughly harmful . Aspirin and
all coal tar derivatives actually cause untold numbers of
UNNECESSARY DEATHS, with Aspirin worst of all because
it fairly beguiles by its quick relief of pain. .Aspirin/
whatever the advertisements say, puts a doubleToad on
&e heart. It weakens the heart and all the vital forces,
^feady taxed to the utmost by disease, and at best it
lengthens the convalescence by three or four times that
of the convalescence of those treated by homoeopathy.

The remedy you decide to give to-day may not be tne
one necessary to-morrow. The particular symptoms
must be considered at every prescription, and they must
match with what is known of the drug chosen. If you do
select the absolute simillimum to-day such will run a
remarkable recovery and perfect cure, so rapid in fact
that you will get a surprise, and when observed, it is wise
to stop all medicine and allow the homoeopathic stimulus
to work itself out undisturbed, for Nature is an efficient

worker and does not brook over-drugging. One great
difference between the two schools of medicine is that
orthodoxy is always flirting with the ‘ ‘ maximum ’ ’ dose
which may be given without immediate destructive
results, though as long as the “maximum” dose as
printed in orthodox works and as allowed by their
pharmacopoeia is not exceeded, a death certificate is
quite “legal ” and does not entail calling in a coroner.
We homoeopaths can recognize many “ drug-diseases ”
in patients which drift to us from orthodoxy. We
homoeopaths always aim at giving the most minute
medical stimulus, never harmful, which will arouse the
vital reaction towards Natural repair, and we have a
guiding rule {similia) on which to base every prescription .

It was Hippocrates (400 B.c.) who formulated the
dogma we employ, and Hahnemann gave him full
credit for “Let likes be treated by Likes ”. This law
goes back to the beginning of all time, unchanging, and
it is employed the world over by eveiy savage in their
knowledge of local and tribal medicine, though they
know nothing of the underlying law of cure.

The few S5nnptoms I am about to lay before you are
the major indications of each drug or “keynotes ” as
we term them. '.On the first sign of a chill or an influenza
infection having been contracted, izk.Q^^conite^ 2 )X,
or 30) 2jxd:^<ielladonnaJ(ix , 6:i(ror,30^1tefhativelweveryy
lialf-hou's^T' fiv^f six dose^ach/ Put five ro eight
(Jrops (or pills) in Half a glass of wafer. Stir very well,
s yak^a te aspoonful^t a dose/holdingsame in th(S,rnoutti
as long “as is convenient (one minute at least). ““

IFthe invasion is not conquered in a few hours review
the peculiar personal symptoms of the invalid and pick
out the “ similar ” symptoms to be found in the patient
from the following list. The dosage and manner of
taking the medicine will be as given for Aconite and
Belladonna, except that ^e intervals between doses
should be from one hour to’ffiree hours according to the
severity oFthe symptoms, ’ When the patient is feeling
much better — stop all medicii^ — ^for a time. ^ This is
important. Only resort to further medicineV if things
are not still proceeding to a cure.
'''^{i!)\tT^MMwn~seni^ei'viveHs'\'^x, 6 x or 30).; The
Yellow Jasmine of American-lndiaii folk-lore and given
precision by the homoeopaths. This remedy must be

y

taken when the following symptoms or "key-notes”
are present. The patient issPi^ Drowsy'pi.ndDkzy (the
three classiceil"D’s” of thedfiig). Fcvei^thouf thirst,
mere must Be seen trembling, shivering, goose-flesh,
lack of thirst, heavy eyelicls, which will droop,,, half cover-
ing the eyes, generally' with dilated pupils. Cannot think
or fix the attention, irritable ,v wants to be lef|(.pJone/_in
extreme caseftipnconsciousness. delirium,' blurred vision.
Brain feels bruised, dragging pain, worse in the occiput
(above the nape of neck) . .Occiput painstif ten work up
over head at night to frontal region (over eyes) . ,Much
sneezing/ tingling in nose,s^ith discharge. Fullness at
f hot of nose. Face heavy and has a besotted expression
■(compare 'Baptisia ) . T ongue thickly coated, yellowish-
white ; numbness of tongue, feels as if can hardly speak,
to partial paralysis of tongue, which trembles on pro-
trusion. Very copious clear urine, almost water-white.
Head pains often relieved on passing profuse clear
ufine. Heart often feels as if it would stop if patient
did not move about. Dull aching, along spine, even to
its base. Yawning marked. ‘Tremhllng weakness to
coniplete prostration of whole muscular ■system.

Chills begin in extremities, with sensation of heat in
head and face. Wants to lie quite still. If stools are
liquid and day coloured, this remedy is the more surely
indicated.

(KT.B'. — patient need not have all symptoms under
this or any other drug.)

(2) Eupatoriumpe‘^oliatum{2,x,6x or ■y))> Common
names, which are significant— Bone-set Bone-break
and Ague-weed. The great ‘ ‘ keynote ’ ' of this remedy is
its intense pains in the bones especially the long bones
which feel as if bruised or nearly broken. The flesh feels
actually as if beaten. Can't beau the sKghtest touch
Throbbing head pains and a feeling as if the head was
pressed on by a metal cap or band. Soreness of eye-
balls. Hcciput pains worse on lying down Patient
generally thirsty for small sips of cold water. Hoarse-
ness, hacking cough, worse evenings, with soreness and
heat m_ larger air tubes (bronchies). Chest sore on
inspirations. Face flushed.

(3) Bryonia alba (sx, 6x or 30), It makes no differ-
ence with homoeopathic prescribing what the name of
the disease is. If the patienhis easiet by lying perfectly

still, and suffers greatly on tire slightest motion, think of
Bryonia . This type of patient will have intense dryness
of all mucous membranes, even lips become dry and
cracked. Thus it is easy to understand that this patient
will drink large quantities of liquids at anytime, and this
IS a distinguishing keynote. Pains in throat, chest and
head are sharp, cutting and coughing causes splitting
head and chest pains, so that patient will hold those
parts to lessen such pains . The cough is always hard and
dry with little or no expectoration. Pains shoot about
the chest on coughing. The patient will be very consti-
pated with hard dry stools, as if baked. Tongue thickly
coated. Taste insipid or bitter. Patient exceedingly
irritable or angry. Headache commences in the morn-
ing on first opening the eyes, with feeling as if head
would split open.

(4) Arsenicum album {bx. 30) . The patients requiring
this remedy will have great and sudden prostration and
sinking of vital forces, with great mental disturbance,
such as anguish, and intense restlessness Pains and
sensations are described as ‘burning in character.
Intense thirst, but for little sips only (the opposite of
Bryonia). The patient, though burning craves heat,
hot drinks, etc. All symptoms much worse from i to
3 a.m. and worse from cold air and cold things; all
symptoms better from warm air, rooms and applications.
Whilst complaining of internal heat there are many
shiverings and creepy sensations of chilliness There
are often intense shudderings even when burning with
internal heat. Heavy and rheumatic pains in the head ;
profuse watery and corrosive discharge from the nose,
with burning sensations . Severe aching and burning in
the limbs; oppression in the chest with difficulty in
breathing. Eyes burn and water, with scalding tears.
Can’t bear light. Dry fatiguing cough, worse after sun-
down and especially after midnight, and after drinking,
Stools are generally small, dark and offensive, with much
prostration after each stool . F ever runs high . (N . B . —
Be careful of pneumonic complications suddenly setting
in. Such devitalized patients must use bed pan for
safety.) In passing I should like to say to dog-lovers
that this remedy is oftenest required in “Distemper”,
because of the perfect “similarity” of the disease and
drug symptoms. Don’t forget this.

ii

(5) Veratrum viride { 6 x to 30). Note that this acts
more quickly in 6 x and higher. If a serious case has
mtense fever with very foul breath, and note well, with
a narrow red streak down the centre of the tongue
with twitchings and spasms, it will be well to read up
this drug in a Materia Medica to see if patient’s other
symptoms fit in with what is recorded. It is all impor-
tant in many grave cases.

(6) Rhus toxicodendron (33;, bx and 30) To start
with, note how the tongue differs from the tongue of all
other remedies given. The patient will haye&triangular
red tip to the tongue . The rest of the tongue is coated and
very dry. The patient is very restless wants to change
position continually in order to obtain relief of the aches
and pains. Movement only affords temporary relief of
symptoms . Complains of lameness and stiffness . Severe
cases, untreated, would run on to stupor with mild per-
sistent muttering or even delirium. Great sensitiveness
to cold air or draughts Exposing hands out of bed in
cold room will bring on coughing fits Cough is dry,
teasing, continuous and very fatiguing. The reader
must consult a Materia Medica for further details.

(7) Euphrasia (3X, bx or 30J This is the ‘‘Eye-
bright’ of the countryside.

(8) Allium cepa {3X, bx or 30) The wild Mediter-
ranean-shore onion.

These are two very important influenza remedies, each
of which has a clear and opposite indication, impossible
to confuse. Euphrasia has acrid tears and NON-excoriat-
ing discharge from the nose. Allium cepa has copious
watery, and extremely acrid nose discharge, and whilst
the tears may feel to burn, they do not excoriate, and the
Allium S5nnptoms are all better in the open air. Both
these remedies have many other influenza symptoms
which space forbids me to detail. Study your Materia
Medica to enable you to choose tlie curative remedy.

(9) Baptisia (3X, bx or 30) . To close this abbreviated
lesson I must draw your attention to a totally different
and extremely fatal type of influenza, if not treated
homoeopathically. It covers and typifies the fatal
epidemic of 1918, when thousands of lives were lost
because orthodoxy did not know and would not study
homoeopathy. Let us see how this drug acted in 1918.
The late Dr. Byres Moir, one of Britain’s best and known

JL.4St

by my family since 1876, though vastly “over-age”
was placed in medical command of an Atlantic transport
during the War. During the height of that epidemic
scores of poor American soldiers were sewn up and con-
signed to the ocean from all the transports — ^but one !
Dr. Moir told me that he did not lose a single soldier,
due to his being able to “ diagnose Baptisia for his ’flu
cases”. I asked him why he had not reported this
remarkable success to our j ournals . He replied th at he
could not, because he was a public servant in the employ
of the Government. The ‘ ‘ disease-picture ’ ' of that type
of influenza, which fits the “drug-picture” absolutely,
is as follows, and some medical readers will recognize
the precise similarities. The symptoms are somewhat
of a typhus-typhoid nature, putrid,, highly septic, and
. infectious . The mind is confused, running fast to
sfupor j face dark to dusky, with a heavily besotted
expression. Eyes bleared. .Early in the disease/the
1. mind toecomes confused; falfTto sleep before he can
'answeF V’que^^^^ of 'he, stops in the middle of a
sentenced 'i Mouth putrid, ulcer with. f cecal breatE '

"Tfie tongue yellow at first, becomes darkly streaked
down the middle, with many red papillae standing out;
edges dark red and shiny. Tongue -soon becomes
, cracked ' and ulcera,ted, with tendency 'to putrid ulcers
‘tEfoughout the mouth, and with sordes,, (black patches)',
■^n lips and teeth.' Breath becorhe's terribly foul, in fact
all secfetiohs and 3 ,h’charges {urine, stools and sweat)
are extremely offensive. Some patients think that they
are in several pieces, and feel around the bed, trying to
collect the scattered portions . Can only swallow liquids.
Solids gag. Breathing is difficult. Lungs feel com-
pressed. Body feels sore and bruised. .Livid spots and
areas appear all over the body and extremities, and
Without Baptisia these cases are doomed. (Compare our
L'achesis for under-skin hemorrhages, especially in
Yellowfever.) Remember Dr. Moir did not lose a cas^, of
Septic ’flu, or diagnose it what you will. Whatapity for
Eurnanity that orthodoxy won’t study homoeopathy !

PNEUMONIA AND ITS
TREATMENT

The Deadliness of Orthodox Incompetence

By

DR. E. PETRIE HOYLE

Reprinted from ‘‘Heal Thyself,”
November and December 1934

HOMCEOPATHIC PUBLISHING COMPANY
12 Warwick Lane, London, E.C.4

PNEUMONIA AND ITS TREATMENT

The Deadliness of Orthodox Incompetence
By Dr. E. Petrie Hoyle

An orthodox authority says that '' ten per cent, of all
deaths in the civilized countries are due to pneumonia and
that practically thirty per cent, of all pneumonia cases
are sure to die When pneumonia is treated homceo-
pathicaUy less than five per cent. die. These two averages
are for adult cases, of aU classes and all ages. What I
have to say to you regarding the terrible difference in
death risks demands your earnest and immediate attention.

The mortality statistics prove many things. The
orthodox figures are taken from their own records. They
were compiled for the guidance of their own men and this
guarantee likewise holds when homoeopathic figures are
given. The very great difference in death rates shows
the serious extra risk you run if you are being treated by
orthodox methods. You are much safer if you employ
homoeopathy. Of course you should try and obtain
the services of a doctor practising homoeopathy, but if
you cannot obtain a homoeopathic doctor you will fare
better if you take a homoeopathic materia medica or
family manual and match the personal symptoms of any
given case, speaking now of pneumonia, and then give or
take the homoeopathic remedy which produces most
nearly the disease symptoms found at the moment.

It is the '' peculiar personal symptoms ” of any patient
which point to the one drug required. Diagnosis, which
may be incorrect, is of secondary importance. Nature
speaks with exactness through the patient's expressions
of suffering and these must be matched exactly with what
we homoeopaths have recorded in our materia medicas.
Were I suffering with a pneumonia and were no homoeo-
pathic doctor at hand, I would prefer to be treated by a
layman or woman of average intelligence armed with one

3

of our books and remedies than by the most famous
orthodox diagnostician and lung specialist.

There is much to be said on the subject, all of vital
importance. I have several points to make :

(1) To prove that there is a very great difference in the
death risks between the two schools of medicine, orthodox
and homoeopathic.

(2) To make my second point I must quote the bewil-
dered groping of orthodoxy as to their own drugs, the use
of which results in a thirty per cent, death loss. At the
same time I must register some of the orthodox warnings
as to the actual dangers of their own drugs and, note
well, we homoeopaths never give warnings about any drug
we use because we have no need to do so. There is no
danger in any medicine we employ, and babies may be
given any drug we name.

(3) To offset the dangers of orthodox medical measures
I must lay before you a clear but brief description of a few
important homoeopathic remedies which enable us to save
so many lives. Each homoeopathic drug will portray
clearly a particular type of phase of a pneumonia process
and it is necessary to match the patient's s3miptoms with
one of the drugs described when an amelioration or cure
will ensue. If you select correctly, you cannot fail.

Homoeopathy never indulges in such weak expressions
as this or that drug may be tried " which is common to
many orthodox medical works. This bespeaks a bungling
and bewildered groping.

Now for the contradictions and dangers of orthodoxy.
It was no less a man than Dr. Blumgart who in his five
public lectures sponsored by the Faculty of Medicine of
Harvard University Medical School stated that “ thirty
per cent, of all pneumonia cases are sure to die He,
an orthodox doctor, speaking for the second to none "
medical school in U.S.A. gave his message to the laity
and we are following suit now with our side of the question
and testimony.

The late Sir William Osier (Oxford University) put their
orthodox death risk at higher than this thirty per cent,
(see statistics). Note well that all my statistics are taken
from public institutions and not from private practice.

4

The classification and diagnoses were aU made at the
bedside, with many onlookers present, including the
nurses, and many nurses are exceedingly intelligent. So
doctors are not likely to make too many errors in diag-
nosis. In fact that work is left to well-known diagnos-
ticians. We may take it that the mistake of the disease
pneumonia is not often made. When death occurs, the
physicians cannot be expected to enter the cause of death
as Digitalis, Strophanthin, or some antipyretic or serums.
So the cause of death is put down to pneumonia. There-
fore we may take it that the mortality rates of the hos-
pitals are as stated. The t5^e or class of pneumonia which
kills is more or less a matter of personal opinion. There
are at present four classes or t5ipes of pneumonia. I read
last week that some diagnostician has divided one class
into twenty-seven varieties, though he did not pretend
that this reduced the mortality one iota, and so it goes
on ad infinitum, with a fairly constant death rate of
orthodoxy of thirty per cent., which has held good for
the last fifty years.

How many tens of thousands of lives could have been
saved in this half century had homoeopathy only been
employed ?

Homoeopathy has a guiding rule, Similia, to help the
prescriber. Orthodoxy has no rule. It relies on personal
opinions. Their works on medicine are out of date every
few years as the second-hand bookshops will tell you.
This quick change is not advance. It is bewilderment.

Homoeopaths, both professional and lay supporters,
know what medicine to give and exactly why.

Sir Farquhar Buzzard, when addressing the Birming-
ham University Medical School in 1929, said to
graduates and undergraduates : “ If our profession as a
whole is to attain its rightful position, let us cease to
profess to cure.” I ask you not only how this strikes
you, but what effect it must have had on all the
undergraduates soon to be let loose on the suffering
public ?

An Oxford University Medical Textbook (orthodox, of
course), states : “ In fifty years to come the lay people
will stand aghast at the barbarities perpetuated m the
name of medicine to-day.”

Dear orthodox colleagues (for I know that some of

5

you read this journal) and my unknown lay readers, I am
fighting and “ Heal Thyself ” is fighting to save people’s
lives. So do not treat this information lightly, or you
may live to regret it.

Listen to this levity on the part of an orthodox leader.
The late Sir WUliam Osier, Regius Professor of Medicine,
Oxford University, a man at the top of the orthodox
medical tree, said (see page 278, Practical Medical Series,
1931) : " The family as well as the patient must be

treated, and any concoction with a striking colour, a
definite taste and pleasant smeU, and finally above aU
being perfectly harmless, will often aid not only the family,
but indirectly the patient and the physician.” This serves
to show us all how little the orthodox believe in their
medicines.

The Public Health Department of Massachusetts,
U.S.A., compiled the very latest information as to the
orthodox practice in treating pneumonia. They infonn
the orthodox profession “ that their much vaunted sera
have fallen into disuse in consequence of their obvious
disadvantages, such as the immense dosages necessary,
the technical difficulties of their administration . . .

the very serious reactions (deaths) following serum
sickness being common. . . . Theoretically sera ought

to do good but they have failed ... we (the ortho-
dox) lack a serum free from defects due to the amount
of protein present in horse serum, which gives frequent
and violent chills, as well as very high temperatures and
a number of fatal cases immediately following injections
have been reported (and how many such deaths not so
reported ?) . . . Specific treatment of pneumonia

by serum is by no means solved.” So seemingly is the
knell sounded on the much vaunted serum " experiment ”
of orthodoxy, and what of the recipients of such treat-
ment ? Many are beyond making any sort of report.

I only mention a few drugs in everyday use by the
orthodox in their pneumonia cases. They carry innumer-
able and very grave warnings issued by the authors to
the orthodox profession.

Heroin is a preparation derived from Morphia. It has
hosts of trade names. It allays cough. I can vouch for
this personally as I was treated thus in France during
the War and I nearly " turned my toes up to the daisies

6

It stopped my cough by drying up the secretions in the
lungs which should have been coughed up. I nearly
suffocated. Fortunately I was able to crawl out of my
bed and get hold of my own homoeopathic remedies.
It surely stops coughs ; but the patient is found to be
in a worse plight than before. He has a pneumonia
plus a drug disease.

Orthodoxy warns its practitioners thus about Heroin :

It has a depressant action on the cord and especially on
the respiratory centre, very much greater than that of
Morphia ... it is advisable to commence with
very small doses as some persons are easily affected by
it. . . . Repeated doses have produced poisonous

symptoms. It is a highly dangerous drug which ought
not to be allowed in practice.'’

Digitalis. Nearly every case of pneumonia in orthodox
hands receives this drug. Let us examine as briefly as
possible some of its terrible risks, which would fill a book.
I have read some important orthodox medical works of
reference in which not one word was said of the cumulative
action of Digitalis. Yet others emphasize that its action
does pile up in the patient to a most dangerous degree.
This danger being known, it is little short of wickedness
when this is not stated as a warning. The following are
brief extracts from a number of standard orthodox
medical works :

There is no evidence of benefit from Digitalis in pneu-
monia, except in a possible 5 per cent, of cases. There
is actual harm to the patient if the drug is given until its
toxic symptoms appear. . . . There is no justification

for its routine use as is the custom in so many hospitals.

. . . There is considerable danger in prescribing

Digitalis. . . . Digitalis requires the greatest caution

to avoid toxic (poisonous) symptoms.” (From Massa-
chusetts Board of Health warnings to the profession.)

Blumer's edition of Billings-Forcheimer [Therapeutics
of Medicine, Vol. II, p. 782 et seq.), frankly advises thus :
‘'It is sufficient to Digitalize the heart ” (which flatly
contradicts the warnings of the former authority and
these contradictions appear throughout orthodox medical
works).

At this point I must quote what a very great homoeo-
pathic author and college professor had to say about

7

Digitalis. In his materia medica Dr. J, Tyler Kent pic-
tures the drug thus : Digitalis has done more mischief
in orthodox hands than any other drug. Every patient
who has a fast beating heart or anything the matter with
the heart is given Digitalis. It has caused more deaths
than any other drug. The orthodox call it a sedative ;
yes, it is a sedative. It makes the patient very sedate.
You have seen how sedate a patient looks after he has
been in the hands of an undertaker and has on his best
clothes.” That is what Digitalis does and yet it is one
of the three chief drugs of the orthodox for pneumonia.

When an average orthodox doctor thinks he dare not
give another drop of Digitalis he turns at once to Strophan-
thill, or Strophanthine. It is mentioned in all their medical
works.

Strophanthine (Massachusetts Board of Health advice,
page 148). '' This drug is warmly advocated by Meara and
others, but it should not he given in a case of pneumonia
when Digitalis has been given just previously, as instances
of sudden death following its tt^se have been recorded. . . .

The action of Strophanthine is but little more prompt
than Digitalis and because of the danger attending its
use it seems to be of little value, etc.” Keeping in mind
and having to guess at what is meant by '' not just pre-
viously ” I turn to the Quick Reference Book of Medicine
and Surgery, by Dr. Rehberger of Johns Hopkins Univer-
sity, sixth edition, and read that “ it must not be used
for at least two days after Digitalis has been administered
. . . It may cause paralysis of the voluntary and in-

voluntary heart miiscle by direct action ” (and this is printed

Dangerous ” in extra heavy black-faced type). This
notice is found under Strophanthine, yet under Digitalis
there is no word of warning that Strophanthine must not
follow on Digitalis. Here indeed is a very great danger
and who waits “ two whole days ” in any pneumonia case
to give the next dose of medicine ?

In this connection one more quotation is absolutely
necessary and if anything I suggest that it almost puts
the last two authors in the criminal negligence
category”.

I read in Blumer's Billings-Forcheimer's Therapeutics
of Internal Diseases, Vol. II, p. 792. . . . Never

give Strophanthine to those who have had Digitalis. . . .

8

Cases of sudden death follow. . . . Strophanthine
should under no circumstances whatever be given if Digitalis
has been employed any time within at least a week.” Here
are some death dealing errors in standard orthodox pro-
fessional works having International use and very large
sales.

My dear orthodox colleague please explain to me, what
happens to all those thousands of patients who get the
two drugs after " two days interval ”, whilst the number
who have had the combination of these two drugs though
“ not just previously ” whatever that may mean, why —
God help them and the orthodox men who follow that
advice.

If the authority who demands that “ full seven days
must elapse between Strophanthine and Digitalis or they
will kill ” is correct then many have been just ” plain-
killed-by-misadventure-or-ignorance ” and perhaps this
explains the 30 per cent, death rate in some degree.

Having quoted from American authorities, I must now
quote a British source, as this is mainly for a British
reading public. Turn to The Principles and Practice of
Medicine written by the late Sir William Osier, Regius
Professor of Medicine at Oxford University and formerly
of Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, and later at
McGiUs University at Montreal, professorships which
proclaim his pre-eminence in orthodox matters. Recent
editions are by Dr. McCrae. It has run to the eleventh
edition with well over a quarter of a million copies sold.

A weak feature in this work is that " may be tried ”
is used, as also " may be given ” which sounds like experi-
ments on the sick. For pneumonia this work advises
Optochin, a Quinine derivative, explaining that “ experi-
mentally on mice its value is encouraging but scarcely
good enough ”. Further an overdose of this drug causes
disturbance of vision. Bleeding is again in fashion
(orthodox) to be done " late in the disease ”. If my
memory does not play me false. Sir Clifford Allbutt
(Regius Professor of Medicine at Cambridge University)
suggests bleeding early. So the profession may toss up,
having equal authority, early or late, whatever happens.

Osier’s book advises Serum, contrary to many U.S.A.
authorities. Vaccines are of no value “ now ”, though
they had their experimental rage a few years ago.

9

Here is a jar for the profession (and some patients).
Osier and McCrae advise Digitalis and Strophanthine for
pneumonias in adjoining lines (page 105, eleventh edition)
with absolutely no mention of any dangers. There is,
moreover, no mention of any cumulative power and danger
when speaking of Digitalis, and as their dose of this drug
when given is XV minims three or four times daily, one
must wonder what has happened to thousands of pneu-
monia cases so treated.

To quieten the nervous system Osier and Co. advise
Bromides, Chloral hydrate, Morphia, Barbital (so recently
sternly warned against by Sir William Willcox). Osier
and Co. also advise Codein, Heroin, and Morphia to
quieten the cough and they warn that “ expectorant
drugs upset the stomach There is not much comfort
to be gained from a survey of this book which has been
sold well in excess of 250,000 copies.

I will now describe some homoeopathic remedies for
pneumonia with a clearness of detail absolute^ unknown
in any orthodox medical work. I think a few orthodox
medicos may read these lines. To such I say : Have you
ever watched one of your own family die, feeling that
the illness need not, should not, have ended in death ?
Did you ever, in the chill silent hours of a long sleepless
night wonder what those homoeopaths would do for such
a case which was weighing you down ? Perhaps you even
cursed your orthodox Materia Medica teachers and all
your medical works. Well, you can learn what the homoeo-
paths would do and have done.

To the laity I say ; Whilst you are waiting to obtain a
professed homoeopathic doctor study homoeopathy seri-
ously and " Heal Thyself ” will help you. With care you
caimot lose half the cases that the orthodox practitioner
does. Shun all " fever-breakers ”. They kill. The heart
burdened by a pneumonia cannot stand the extra load of
a fever-breaker nor Digitalis, Strophanthine, Heroin, etc.

The following homoeopathic remedies help us to keep
our death rate at under 5 per cent, in public hospitals
though in private practice I thoroughly believe the death
rate is very much lower.

Aconite (3X, 6x to 30). At the first possible moment,
when it is thought that a chdl has been contracted, which
may turn into many things and when shivers and

lO

shudderings are first noted, take doses of Acointe every
fifteen minutes. As favourable reaction is felt take every
two hours. Stop medicine the moment the patient feels
better. Let the drug work on. It may be found in a
few hours that the chill has been conquered and the nor-
mal restored. So always have a bottle of homoeopathically
diluted Aconite on hand. When a chill is more serious,
besides the shiverings some fever will be felt. Continue
the Aconite until it is felt that there is some local conges-
tion, when another drug must be considered whose symp-
toms compare with the new disease symptoms. The
new and local symptoms will fix the attention of the
patient or the attendant so consider them at once. It
is not necessary to wait until pneumonia is apparent. This
cannot be told well under twenty-four hours, when precious
time has been lost, but if Aconite has been taken immedi-
ately the slightest chili has been felt any threatened
trouble will have been reduced in severity or thwarted
entirely.

The most common serious symptoms requiring Aconite
are as follows. Mind : Great fear and anxiety ; fears he
will be ill a long time, very restless. Head : Fullness,
heavy, hot, bursting pain, burning heat, vertigo, worse on
rising and in extreme cases the mind may wander even to
some delirium. The eyes feel hot and dry. Face is red,
hot, flushed, or one cheek is red and the other pale (this is
more often seen in the very young). Chest : oppressed
breathing, shortness of breath, hoarse dry cough, with
all symptoms worse at night and after midnight. Heart
beats felt, pulse full and hard, tense and bounding, arteries
easily felt, especially in temples and throat. There will be
very marked thirst. The skin will be hot and dry to
the touch. There will be shudderings which merge into
tiny shivers. Such are the chief symptoms of an acute
chili. Aconite taken early enough will thwart many
such attacks overnight.

I have for many years relied on using in alteimation
Aconite and Belladonna which is the only instance in my
work of using two drugs almost at one time. I have used
them all through my four years' War work and since.
To mix one’s drugs as a rule weakens one’s judgment.
Professor Hempel said that Aconite controls and corrects
the arterial circulation, whilst Belladonna acts in same

II

manner on the venous circulations. I have adopted
his life-long method of alternating Aconite with Bella-
donna in the or 6% potency in every case of chill or
suspected chill, which, if not stopped, might run on into
pneumonia, bronchitis, pleurisy, etc. These two drugs are
given fifteen minutes apart, alternately, for some five
or six doses each, then drop to two hours apart during
waking hours, not being like the night nurse who woke
her patients regularly to give them their sleeping medicine.

If Aconite has been given, or Aconite and Belladonna in
alternation, the original symptoms will probably be soon
replaced by a different disease picture, which calls for a
remedy matching these new symptoms. A few examples
will show how a subsequent medicine is selected.

Bryonia alba 2^, 6x or 30. Bryonia cures or alleviates
the following symptoms : '' Stitching cutting pains in
various parts of the chest or lungs. Patient is irritable
and fretful. Pains grow worse and at last become tearing
in character. A child too young to speak will vaguely
try to place its hands on the painful region. The cough
is very dry and hurts acutely and, most important, the
patient will try by every means to lessen the movement
of the chest wall or lungs. Bryonia is particularly in-
dicated in pneumonia, rheumatism, etc., if the patient
is worse by movement, A sick man needing Bryonia
lies absolutely still and as pressure relieves he lies on the
painful side. Another characteristic is great thirst for
large quantities of fluid, due to dryness of membranes, lips
dry and parched, mouth and tongue dry, tongue coated
yellow or brown. The Bryonia-netding patient is usually
constipated and has dry stools. Phlegm raised by much
coughing is very tough and stringy. The pains of the
patient needing Bryonia are particularly of a stitching
character. Bryonia is all-important in pleurisy and should
be prescribed for the symptoms mentioned, whether
there is pleurisy or not.

Phosphorus 6x to 30 will alleviate and cure the following
very grave symptoms. The patient has high fever with
a hard full pulse, expectorations are dark, blood-stained,
due to dead, cast-off blood cells. This expectoration is
called prune juice expectoration and it occurs in a very
grave phase. The cough is hacking and weakening
and there are pronounced burning sensations in many parts.

12

Hands and feet are uncovered continually to get cool,
breathing is oppressed and laboured, mucous is purulent
and profuse, cough is excited by a tickling sensation,
burning heat alternates with shivering and there is a
great thirst for cold drink. The Phosphorus-n^^Amg patient
often vomits the cold drink as soon as it has become
warm in the stomach. This is a leading S5nnptom calling
for Phosphorus, Phosphorus will snatch out of the jaws of
deathmany patients who have these most grave symptoms.

For a time orthodox doctors employed Phosphorus,
but they had not properly learned from the homoeo-
paths how to use it. They gave Phosphorus in huge
doses and did much mischief. Professor Schroff wrote in
his Pharmacology, page 418 : The internal use of Phos-
phorus has been abandoned for the reason that even the
most cautious employment of this drug involves danger.
Phosphorus is no longer used except bj^ the homoeopaths
and the veterinary surgeons.” In the minute doses of
homoeopathy Phosphorus carries no risk whatever and is
a magnificent help in cases which from the orthodox point
of view are incurable.

Antimonium tartaricnm 3x, 6 % or 30. This drug is of
the greatest value in cases where there is deficient reaction,
and it is specially called for in the treatment of the old
and the very young. The patient needing Antimonium
tartaricum is becoming stifled with phlegm which he
cannot raise. He will try to sit up in order to breathe.
Attacks of coughing provoke a sensation of suffocation.
Coughing is often followed by vomiting, sensations of
nausea, and the expectoration is always thick and terribly
difficult to bring up. The patient is always hoping that
the next cough will rid him of the mucous but it does not
do so and he is becoming rapidly exhausted by trying to
raise the tough phlegm, which blocks the lungs and will
drown the patient. Orthodox medicine gives Anti-
monium tartaricum in the usual large and dangerous doses
which do infinite mischief.

Every phase of the disease must be matched with the
corresponding remedy. The few examples given must
suffice to show the principles by which homoeopathy acts
and saves those who would die under orthodox treat-
ment. I now would give some comparative statistics,
giving the mortality from pneumonia under orthodox

13

and homoeopathic treatment. These speak for them-
selves and they show the great superiority of homoeopathy
over orthodox medicine.

Death Rates in Pneumonias (Adults)

Orthodox Mor-

tality
per
cent.

Sir Wm. Osier, Practice of

Medicine, 6th edition,
page 187.

General Hospital rates . . 2o-.iio
Montreal General Hos-
pital . . . . . . 20 • 40

Charity Hospital, New

Orleans .. ..28-01

Johns Hopkins University

Hospital (whites) .. 25-00
Johns Hopkins University
Hospital (blacks) . . 30-00
Pennsylvania Hospital 29 • 00
St. Thomas’ Hospital,
London :

In 3rd decade (20-30) . . 22-00

In 4th decade (30-40) . . 30-80

In 5th decade (40-50) . . 47-00

In 6th decade (50-60) . . 51-00

In 7th decade (60-70) .. 65-00

Professor Allbutt (Regius
Professor of Medicine
Cambridge University) ,

System of Medicine,

(10 vols.), page 136 ;

Vol. V, Hospital rate . . 25-50
Massachusetts Board of
Health (1931) average
“ IV classes . .. 29-50

Dr. Blumgart “ Public
Lectures ’ ’ Harvard
series :

" 30 per cent, are sure to

die ’ * . . . . . . 30 • 00

U.S. Daily News Report,
Washington D.C. Dec-
ember ist, 1931 .. 25-50

Blumer Billings-Forcheimer :
Four ''class” average 27-40
Class II .. ..30-10

Class III .. ..45-40

Another series .. 26-20

' ' Antibody series ” . . 19*90
Without "Antibody”

control . . . . 28 • 30

Medical Century (N.Y.)

August, 19x2, average
for last 32 years . . 29-50

Homceopathic Mor-
tality
per
cent.

Dr. E. Rodney Fiske (see
Journal A mencan Insti-
tute of Homoeopathy,

Vol. XXI, pp. 886,
October, 192S : 17,669
. cases, 717 deaths . . 4-05

Treated purely Homoeo-
pathically . . . . 2-80

Mixed treatments
(homoeopathic plus
vaccines) . . . . 6-20

Treated with Sera, Anti-
body or vaccines . . 12*20
Homoeopathy plus Digi-
talis . . . . ..13*70

Hahnemann Hospital
(1918-1928) Philadel-
phia (pure homoeo-
pathy) . . . . . . 7-00

London Homceopathic
Hospital . . . . 7*00

Logic of Figures, p. 164,
published by Boericke
& Tafel, Philadelphia,
data of 7 American
Homoeopathic Hos-
pitals . . . , . . 4-50

In Dr. Hughes' Principles
and Practice of Homceo-
pathy, p. 552, shows the
Homoeopathic death
rate in France rarely
exceeds . . . . 6 • 00

Medical Century (N.Y.),
August, 1912, average
for last 32 years . . 3-90

14

Pneumonias in Children

Orthodox Mor-
tality
per
cent.

Dr. G. F. Still, DUeases of
Children, 2nd edition,
pp. 320-321. Children
up to 12 years of age 45-90
Infants, first two years of

life . . - . . . 64 • 40

also :

Dr. Voelcker's" open-air ”
Broncho-Pneumonias
ditto “ indoor treatment ’ ' 06-90
ditto with Whooping

cough .. .. ..50-00

Homceopathic Mor-
tality
per
cent.

Dr. J. Roberson Day, late
Physician of Children
at the Royal London
Homoeopathic Hos-
pital ;

Broncho-Pneumonia

under two years . . 20-00

Lobar-Pneumonia under

two years . . . . 7-80

Broncho- Pneumonia over

two years .. ..10-50

Lobar-Pneumonia over

two years of age . . 3-60

(The above averages for
ten years’ period all at
the Royal London
Homa'opathic Hos-
pital)

Death Rates in Pneumonias (Children, continued)

The following list was
presented at the Inter-
national Homoeopathic
Congres.s, London, by
Dr. J. R. Day. Table
compiled from Dr.
Emmett Holt, Ortho-
dox Children's special-
ist, Pneumonia :

Primary to Broncho-

Pneumonia . . ., 49-40

Secondary to Measles .. 62*90
Secondary to Pertussis

(Whooping cough) 81-80
Secondary to Diphtheria too * 00
and all the following were
collected by Dr. J. R.

Day :

Acute Pnetimonia :

Hospital for Sick Chil-
dren, London; Queen’s
Hospital for Children ;
Victoria Hospital for
Children ; East Lon-
don Plospital for Chil-
dren (all of London) ;
Manchester Hospital
for Children ; these
5 hospitals averaged . . 24-70

Hahnemann Homoeo-
pathic Hospital, Liver-
pool, England, figures
given by Dr. J. R.

Day at International
Homceopathic Congress
at London ; average
covering 20 years of
cases, all infants and
children .. 15*30)

Also given by Dr. J. R.

Day at same Inter-
national Homoeopathic
Congress .

Acute Pneumonia — in-'
chiding all complications
(such a s opposite) . . 12*30-

This a vera ge w^a s for th e
Royal Loncion Homoeo-
pathic Hospital (ten
years' average)

15

Death Rates in Pneumonias (Children, continued)

Orthodox Mor-
tality
per
cent.

Lohar’-Pneumonia :

Hospital for Sick Chil-
dren, and East London
Hospital for Children
(both London) ; Man-
chester Children’s Hos-
pital ; average .. 32-00

Broncho-Pneumonia :

Hospital for Sick Chil-
dren, and East London
Hospital for Children
(both London), and
Manchester Children’s
Hospital ; average for
these three . . . . 45 • 10

Homceopathic Mor-
tality
per
cent.

Lobar Pneumonia :

Royal London Homoeo-
pathic Hospital (ten
years’ average, includ-
ing all complications) 7*80

Broncho-Pneumonia :

Royal London Homoeo-
pathic Hospital (ten
years’ average, includ-
ing all complications) 20*0

Dr. J. Roberson Day was Senior Physician for “ Diseases
of Children '' at the Royal London Homoeopathic Hos-
pital for many years, so it is to be presumed that he was
thoroughly conversant with the death rates of his own
and many other hospitals in Great Britain. His heart
and soul was in this work, and he would not juggle any
figures for any price. I have known him well for about
forty years.

These figures of Adult Losses are worth the study by
all adults, and the Governing bodies of the nation, as well
as at all hospitals, if they have the public welfare at
heart. The different rates in child losses should go to the
heart of every woman, indeed every parent. Won't
you make the study of Homoeopathy a real Life Work ?
and then spread the value right and left.

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